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Cáceres fire, October 2019 Cáceres, Poconé

Out · last detection 5 Nov 2019, 18:03 UTC

The fire started on 24 October 2019 in Cáceres, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 16,109 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 254th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 76 in Brazil in 2019, of 974.

Burnt area
16,109ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
24 Oct 2019 – 5 Nov 2019
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
24 Oct
2019
Heat detections
810
in a single hotspot: 209 MW
Danger at start
4
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
12.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Nov 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Oct5 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

24262728293012345

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
44km/h · peak gust
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 14.6 mm on 6 Nov.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Cáceres 89,681 inhabitants where it started
    10,747 ha reached on 22 Oct
    0.4 %
  2. Poconé 31,217 inhabitants
    5,492 ha reached on 26 Oct
    0.3 %

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)
22 Oct 32.3 °C 50 % 25 km/h 3.0 mm Very low 4
23 Oct 36.2 °C 37 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
24 Oct 39.6 °C 26 % 17 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
25 Oct 38.5 °C 29 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
26 Oct 38.5 °C 37 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
27 Oct 38.8 °C 34 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
28 Oct 39.6 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Oct 39.1 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
30 Oct 40.3 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Oct 36.6 °C 40 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
1 Nov 34.9 °C 46 % 32 km/h 1.1 mm Moderate 18
2 Nov 37.1 °C 39 % 35 km/h 1.0 mm High 23
3 Nov 35.7 °C 39 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
4 Nov 37.7 °C 36 % 39 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
5 Nov 36.7 °C 41 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
6 Nov after 30.4 °C 65 % 28 km/h 14.6 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Oct 2019
After · 12 Nov 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 · 810Every 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 Cáceres fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 October 2019 and 5 November 2019: 13 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 16,109 hectares (161.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cáceres (10,747 ha, 0.4 %); Poconé (5,492 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class 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.