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Bagaces fire, March 2020 Bagaces

Out · last detection 23 Mar 2020, 06:59 UTC

The fire started on 12 March 2020 in Bagaces, Costa Rica, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,063 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 17th largest in Provincia Guanacaste since 2016 (of 111 with a page). Number 2 in Costa Rica in 2020, of 11.

Burnt area
3,063ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
12 Mar 2020 – 23 Mar 2020
Municipalities hit
1
cantons
Started on
12 Mar
2020
Heat detections
120
in a single hotspot: 130 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Mar 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Mar23 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

121314151617181920212223

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
77km/h · peak gust
42%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,198 ha in 2016, 1,170 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,206 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bagaces where it started
    3,083 ha reached on 6 Mar
    2.4 %

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)
6 Mar 30.9 °C 52 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
7 Mar 29.9 °C 55 % 77 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
8 Mar 30.6 °C 50 % 76 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
9 Mar 31.8 °C 45 % 74 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
10 Mar 31.4 °C 50 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
11 Mar 30.1 °C 56 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
12 Mar 30.0 °C 55 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
13 Mar 31.9 °C 52 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
14 Mar 32.1 °C 51 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
15 Mar 30.8 °C 52 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
16 Mar 31.0 °C 49 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
17 Mar 31.3 °C 49 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
18 Mar 31.4 °C 49 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Mar 31.4 °C 45 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
20 Mar 30.7 °C 49 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
21 Mar 30.6 °C 49 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
22 Mar 31.0 °C 51 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Mar 30.8 °C 49 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
24 Mar after 31.7 °C 49 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
25 Mar after 33.2 °C 42 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
26 Mar after 33.0 °C 44 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
27 Mar after 34.3 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
28 Mar after 32.2 °C 48 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
29 Mar after 32.0 °C 44 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
30 Mar after 32.9 °C 46 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
31 Mar after 33.3 °C 44 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
1 Apr after 34.4 °C 46 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
2 Apr after 34.5 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
3 Apr after 35.3 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
4 Apr after 35.2 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
5 Apr after 35.3 °C 40 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 32

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Mar 2020
After · 30 Mar 2020

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 · 120Every 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 Costa Rica ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bagaces fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 March 2020 and 23 March 2020: 12 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 3,063 hectares (30.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bagaces (3,083 ha, 2.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.2 °C, humidity dropped to 42 % and gusts hit 77 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Costa Rica (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: 911

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.

Report an error
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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 911.

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 (CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication). 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.