Caapucu fire, February 2025 Caapucu, Villa Oliva, Villa Franca
The fire started on 28 February 2025 in Caapucu, Paraguay, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,160 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 30th largest in Paraguarí since 2016 (of 68 with a page). Number 25 in Paraguay in 2025, of 64.
The power measured by the satellite is low (26.9 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
- 2,160ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 10days
- 28 Feb 2025 – 9 Mar 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 28 Feb
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 69
- in a single hotspot: 27 MW
- Danger at start
- 6
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 715MW
- 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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.4 mm on 12 Mar.
This area had burned before
98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,073 ha in 2018, 2,668 ha in 2020, 2,088 ha in 2021, 398 ha in 2022, 657 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,126 ha that had burned before.
- 2,105 ha Villa Oliva fire, December 2021 58,707 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,159 ha Caapucu fire, September 2020 2,532 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,073 ha Villa Oliva fire, August 2018 7,903 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 830 ha Villa Oliva fire, August 2020 12,456 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 530 ha Villa Oliva fire, October 2020 6,465 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 324 ha Caapucu fire, December 2022 1,651 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 8 ha Caapucu fire, May 2020 1,884 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7 ha Caapucu fire, August 2020 6,009 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Caapucu where it started2,035 ha reached on 28 Feb0.8 %
-
99 ha0.1 %
-
33 ha0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28 Feb | 34.5 °C | 53 % | 53 km/h | 0.5 mm | Low 6 |
| 1 Mar | 36.0 °C | 48 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 10 |
| 2 Mar | 37.8 °C | 43 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 11 |
| 3 Mar | 38.5 °C | 36 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 4 Mar | 38.3 °C | 40 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 5 Mar | 38.7 °C | 38 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 6 Mar | 35.7 °C | 44 % | 44 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 7 Mar | 37.6 °C | 33 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 8 Mar | 37.2 °C | 38 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 9 Mar | 27.2 °C | 65 % | 45 km/h | 1.9 mm | Low 6 |
| 10 Mar after | 30.5 °C | 40 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 11 Mar after | 31.4 °C | 46 % | 20 km/h | 0.4 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 12 Mar after | 30.9 °C | 57 % | 21 km/h | 4.4 mm | Very low 2 |
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 March 2025 the air beside the fire reached 109 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 57: 3.8 times the WHO daily 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 · 69Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 7,903 haVilla Oliva28 August 2018 · 3 days · 5 km away
- 12,456 haVilla OlivaAugust 2020 · 14 days · 14 km away
- 16,508 haVilla OlivaFebruary 2022 · 29 days · 19 km away
- 13,060 haVilla OlivaFebruary 2020 · 19 days · 19 km away
- 21,230 haVilla OlivaJuly 2020 · 14 days · 21 km away
- 58,707 haVilla OlivaDecember 2021 · 44 days · 26 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Caapucu fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 February 2025 and 9 March 2025: 10 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 2,160 hectares (21.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Caapucu (2,035 ha, 0.8 %); Villa Oliva (99 ha, 0.1 %); Villa Franca (33 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.7 °C, humidity dropped to 33 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 21, class High.
- 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
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.