How long did the Barra fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 July 2023 and 21 July 2023: 8 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 10,493 hectares (104.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Barra (10,571 ha, 0.9 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 36.0 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 47 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.

BR · Brazil · 2023-07-14 → 2023-07-21

Barra fire, July 2023 Barra

Out · last detection 21 Jul 2023, 16:38 UTC

The fire started on 14 July 2023 in Barra, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 10,493 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 88th largest in Bahia since 2016 (of 466 with a page). Number 49 in Brazil in 2023, of 431.

Burnt area: 10,493ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 8days; 14 Jul 2023 – 21 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 14 Jul; 2023
Heat detections: 373; in a single hotspot: 174 MW
Danger at start: 37; High · FWI index
Energy released: 11.5GW; sum of detected power

Play back 21 Jul 2023

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Jul21 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1415161718192021

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

47km/h · peak gust

19%lowest humidity

It had gone 59 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 10,506 ha in 2021.

10,506 ha Wanderley fire, September 2021 216,996 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Barra 51,092 inhabitants where it started

10,571 ha reached on 14 Jul

0.9 %

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)
14 Jul	35.4 °C	22 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
15 Jul	36.0 °C	19 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
16 Jul	34.6 °C	24 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
17 Jul	34.0 °C	21 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
18 Jul	34.2 °C	21 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
19 Jul	34.3 °C	20 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
20 Jul	32.2 °C	25 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
21 Jul	31.3 °C	30 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 47
22 Jul after	29.1 °C	43 %	40 km/h	0.5 mm	High 35
23 Jul after	30.8 °C	32 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
24 Jul after	31.4 °C	30 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
25 Jul after	32.5 °C	24 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
26 Jul after	33.5 °C	21 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
27 Jul after	34.8 °C	21 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
28 Jul after	33.3 °C	29 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
29 Jul after	34.2 °C	30 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
30 Jul after	35.0 °C	28 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
31 Jul after	33.8 °C	26 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
1 Aug after	33.5 °C	24 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
2 Aug after	32.8 °C	30 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
3 Aug after	34.1 °C	28 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
4 Aug after	34.6 °C	26 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 7 Jul 2023

After · 28 Jul 2023

Before After

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

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 15 July 2023 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 15: 1.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak30 µg/m³

Days over the guideline1 day

PM1043 µg/m³

Optical depth0.36

WHO 15

12131415161718192021222324

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 373Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Barra fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 July 2023 and 21 July 2023: 8 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 10,493 hectares (104.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Barra (10,571 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 36.0 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 47 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

INPE · Programa Queimadas ↗
IBAMA · Prevfogo ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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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What really happened?

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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.

Where it burned