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Barra do Bugres fire, September 2017 Barra do Bugres

Out · last detection 20 Sept 2017, 04:41 UTC

The fire started on 12 September 2017 in Barra do Bugres, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,702 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 1561th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 718 in Brazil in 2017, of 994.

The power measured by the satellite is low (17.9 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
3,702ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
12 Sept 2017 – 20 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
12 Sept
2017
Heat detections
149
in a single hotspot: 18 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
605MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Sept 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Sept20 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

121314151617181920

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
42km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.8 mm on 25 Sept.

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 do Bugres where it started
    3,725 ha reached on 12 Sept
    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)
12 Sept 34.3 °C 37 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
13 Sept 35.8 °C 30 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
14 Sept 35.4 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
15 Sept 36.2 °C 21 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
16 Sept 26.2 °C 49 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
17 Sept 27.2 °C 47 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
18 Sept 34.4 °C 29 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
19 Sept 35.7 °C 28 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
20 Sept 35.6 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Sept after 34.9 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Sept after 34.4 °C 32 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
23 Sept after 34.5 °C 30 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
24 Sept after 34.3 °C 37 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
25 Sept after 35.6 °C 32 % 34 km/h 1.8 mm Moderate 20

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Sept 2017
After · 27 Sept 2017

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 · 149Every 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 do Bugres fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 September 2017 and 20 September 2017: 9 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 3,702 hectares (37.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Barra do Bugres (3,725 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, 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.