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Barra fire, July 2021 Barra

Out · last detection 6 Aug 2021, 16:24 UTC

The fire started on 31 July 2021 in Barra, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,534 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 390th largest in Bahia since 2016 (of 466 with a page). Number 658 in Brazil in 2021, of 814.

Burnt area
3,534ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
31 Jul 2021 – 6 Aug 2021
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
31 Jul
2021
Heat detections
268
in a single hotspot: 655 MW
Danger at start
38
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
9.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Aug 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 31 Jul6 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

31123456

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
48km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months 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. Barra 51,092 inhabitants where it started
    3,554 ha reached on 31 Jul
    0.3 %

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)
25 Jul 29.2 °C 39 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
26 Jul 31.5 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
27 Jul 32.4 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
28 Jul 33.9 °C 27 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
29 Jul 36.1 °C 21 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
30 Jul 35.0 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
31 Jul 32.2 °C 37 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
1 Aug 31.5 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
2 Aug 31.2 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Aug 31.4 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
4 Aug 31.7 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
5 Aug 31.7 °C 26 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
6 Aug 31.1 °C 34 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Aug after 30.9 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
8 Aug after 31.7 °C 29 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
9 Aug after 32.3 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
10 Aug after 33.3 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Aug after 33.9 °C 27 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
12 Aug after 34.8 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
13 Aug after 32.2 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Aug after 32.6 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Aug after 32.7 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 Aug after 33.2 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 24 Jul 2021
After · 13 Aug 2021

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 · 268Every 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 Barra fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 31 July 2021 and 6 August 2021: 7 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 3,534 hectares (35.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Barra (3,554 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.1 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, 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.

Report an error
What do you think is wrong?

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.