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Benjamín Aceval fire, August 2019 Benjamín Aceval

Out · last detection 14 Aug 2019, 17:18 UTC

The fire started on 10 August 2019 in Benjamín Aceval, Paraguay, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,519 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 725th largest in PRESIDENTE HAYES since 2016 (of 738 with a page). Number 226 in Paraguay in 2019, of 231.

The power measured by the satellite is low (28.6 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
1,519ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
10 Aug 2019 – 14 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
10 Aug
2019
Heat detections
105
in a single hotspot: 29 MW
Danger at start
2
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
740MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Aug 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Aug14 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

10111314

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
55km/h · peak gust
39%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days 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. Benjamín Aceval where it started
    1,520 ha reached on 6 Aug
    0.1 %

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)
10 Aug 18.0 °C 60 % 36 km/h 1.7 mm Very low 2
11 Aug 26.5 °C 52 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 5
12 Aug 29.9 °C 49 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
13 Aug 19.7 °C 41 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
14 Aug 17.9 °C 39 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
15 Aug after 26.2 °C 46 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
16 Aug after 32.6 °C 37 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
17 Aug after 33.8 °C 32 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
18 Aug after 27.7 °C 59 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
19 Aug after 21.7 °C 44 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
20 Aug after 24.1 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
21 Aug after 27.5 °C 43 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
22 Aug after 25.8 °C 49 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
23 Aug after 25.0 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
24 Aug after 29.2 °C 41 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 3 Aug 2019
After · 21 Aug 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 · 105Every 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 Paraguay ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Benjamín Aceval fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 10 August 2019 and 14 August 2019: 5 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 1,519 hectares (15.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Benjamín Aceval (1,520 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 39 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 17, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Paraguay (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: 132 · 911

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 132 · 911.

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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.