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Barra do Garças fire, August 2019 Barra do Garças, Nova Xavantina, Novo São Joaquim

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2019, 05:12 UTC

The fire started on 19 August 2019 in Barra do Garças, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 32 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 48,852 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 48th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 12 in Brazil in 2019, of 974.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Barra do Garças · 2017Barra do Garças · 2017Barra do Garças · 2017Barra do Garças · 2016

Burnt area
48,852ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
32days
19 Aug 2019 – 19 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
19 Aug
2019
Heat detections
1,829
in a single hotspot: 260 MW
Danger at start
34
High · FWI index
Average daily power
978MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Aug19 Sept
19 Sept 2019

How it evolved, day by day

21 Aug 2019 · 80 MW · 7 22 Aug 2019 · 2,238 MW · 115 23 Aug 2019 · 272 MW · 45 24 Aug 2019 · 485 MW · 75 25 Aug 2019 · 239 MW · 50 26 Aug 2019 · 122 MW · 30 27 Aug 2019 · 336 MW · 30 28 Aug 2019 · 15 MW · 4 29 Aug 2019 · 17 MW · 12 30 Aug 2019 · 973 MW · 56 31 Aug 2019 · 1,737 MW · 106 1 Sept 2019 · 1,239 MW · 67 2 Sept 2019 · 1,001 MW · 94 3 Sept 2019 · 623 MW · 74 4 Sept 2019 · 1,260 MW · 106 5 Sept 2019 · 1,446 MW · 73 6 Sept 2019 · 990 MW · 75 7 Sept 2019 · 2,046 MW · 149 8 Sept 2019 · 1,535 MW · 71 9 Sept 2019 · 966 MW · 65 10 Sept 2019 · 2,440 MW · 50 11 Sept 2019 · 480 MW · 29 12 Sept 2019 · 627 MW · 21 13 Sept 2019 · 1,956 MW · 116 14 Sept 2019 · 1,858 MW · 111 15 Sept 2019 · 734 MW · 40 16 Sept 2019 · 713 MW · 35 17 Sept 2019 · 2,856 MW · 117 18 Sept 2019 · 54 MW · 5 19 Sept 2019 · 2 MW · 1
21 Aug 26 Aug 31 Aug 5 Sept 10 Sept 15 Sept 17 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
46km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.4 mm on 26 Sept.

This area had burned before

66% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,194 ha in 2016, 30,494 ha in 2017, 45 ha in 2018.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 31% of the area of London (489 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Barra do Garças 69,210 inhabitants where it started
    46,041 ha reached on 21 Aug
    5.0 %
  2. Nova Xavantina 24,345 inhabitants
    3,028 ha reached on 7 Sept
    0.5 %
  3. Novo São Joaquim 6,919 inhabitants
    19 ha reached on 6 Sept
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents≈ 30

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.09 hectares of built-up land and about 30 residents (GHSL 2020, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
19 Aug 35.0 °C 26 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Aug 35.8 °C 24 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
21 Aug 35.7 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
22 Aug 36.9 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
23 Aug 37.3 °C 18 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
24 Aug 35.7 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
25 Aug 36.1 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Aug 34.5 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
27 Aug 34.0 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
28 Aug 34.6 °C 26 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 Aug 35.0 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Aug 37.3 °C 20 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
31 Aug 37.5 °C 20 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
1 Sept 38.1 °C 19 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Sept 38.1 °C 22 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
3 Sept 39.3 °C 14 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Sept 39.3 °C 17 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
5 Sept 39.6 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
6 Sept 38.2 °C 15 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
7 Sept 37.0 °C 20 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
8 Sept 36.4 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
9 Sept 37.6 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
10 Sept 37.9 °C 17 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
11 Sept 39.0 °C 18 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
12 Sept 39.7 °C 16 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
13 Sept 39.3 °C 19 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
14 Sept 40.6 °C 12 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
15 Sept 39.4 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
16 Sept 38.8 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
17 Sept 40.2 °C 14 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
18 Sept 39.2 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
19 Sept 38.5 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
20 Sept after 39.0 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
21 Sept after 39.0 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Sept after 39.6 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 48
23 Sept after 38.8 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
24 Sept after 37.8 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
25 Sept after 36.3 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
26 Sept after 27.6 °C 58 % 28 km/h 5.4 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Aug 2019
After · 26 Sept 2019

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 · 1,829Every 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 Garças fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 19 August 2019 to 19 September 2019 (32 days). The perimeter dates it from 21 August 2019 to 18 September 2019.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 48,852 hectares (488.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Barra do Garças (46,041 ha, 5.0 %); Nova Xavantina (3,028 ha, 0.5 %); Novo São Joaquim (19 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.6 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 60, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 18 September 2019 → 19 September 2019.
  2. Start date: 21 August 2019 → 19 August 2019.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 7 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 21 August 2019 to 18 September 2019. 1,829 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.