Barra fire, September 2024 Barra
The fire started on 17 September 2024 in Barra, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,950 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 332th largest in Bahia since 2016 (of 466 with a page). Number 923 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.
- Burnt area
- 3,950ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 17 Sept 2024 – 23 Sept 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 17 Sept
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 96
- in a single hotspot: 159 MW
- Danger at start
- 50
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.8GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
86% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 477 ha in 2017, 1,042 ha in 2018, 588 ha in 2020, 2,434 ha in 2022, 237 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,416 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
3,977 ha reached on 16 Sept0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 Sept | 37.2 °C | 19 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 17 Sept | 38.3 °C | 14 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 18 Sept | 36.5 °C | 14 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 19 Sept | 35.8 °C | 18 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 20 Sept | 36.6 °C | 14 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 21 Sept | 37.7 °C | 14 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 22 Sept | 37.8 °C | 15 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 23 Sept | 38.0 °C | 15 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 24 Sept after | 37.9 °C | 20 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 25 Sept after | 35.9 °C | 23 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 26 Sept after | 35.8 °C | 22 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 27 Sept after | 36.5 °C | 19 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 28 Sept after | 38.8 °C | 15 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 29 Sept after | 38.3 °C | 18 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 60 |
| 30 Sept after | 35.9 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 1 Oct after | 36.7 °C | 16 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 2 Oct after | 36.8 °C | 18 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 3 Oct after | 38.1 °C | 17 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 17 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 14 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
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 · 96Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Barra fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 September 2024 and 23 September 2024: 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 3,950 hectares (39.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Barra (3,977 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, class Extreme.
- 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
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.