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Arraias fire, 24 July 2016 Arraias

Out · last detection 3 Aug 2016, 16:18 UTC

The fire started on 24 July 2016 in Arraias, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,785 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 892th largest in Tocantins since 2016 (of 1242 with a page). Number 440 in Brazil in 2016, of 649.

Burnt area
3,785ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
24 Jul 2016 – 3 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
24 Jul
2016
Heat detections
134
in a single hotspot: 43 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
649MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

3 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Jul3 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

2425262728293031123

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

36°high
44km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 40 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Arraias 10,287 inhabitants where it started
    3,808 ha reached on 24 Jul
    0.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
24 Jul 32.0 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
25 Jul 32.6 °C 29 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
26 Jul 32.5 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 Jul 32.4 °C 28 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
28 Jul 32.8 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
29 Jul 32.5 °C 26 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Jul 31.4 °C 25 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
31 Jul 31.4 °C 29 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
1 Aug 31.2 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
2 Aug 32.3 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Aug 33.4 °C 30 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Aug after 33.1 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Aug after 32.1 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
6 Aug after 32.3 °C 31 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
7 Aug after 33.3 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
8 Aug after 34.7 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Aug after 35.2 °C 22 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
10 Aug after 35.7 °C 22 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
11 Aug after 35.8 °C 20 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Aug after 36.0 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
13 Aug after 35.2 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Aug after 34.5 °C 30 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Aug after 36.1 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
16 Aug after 34.5 °C 32 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Aug after 35.7 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Aug after 36.9 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Aug after 37.0 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
20 Aug after 35.7 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 17 Jul 2016
After · 10 Aug 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 134Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Arraias fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 July 2016 and 3 August 2016: 11 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,785 hectares (37.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Arraias (3,808 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.7 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 47, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Brazil (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 193

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 193.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.