Candelaria fire, 4 May 2023 Candelaria
The fire started on 4 May 2023 in Candelaria, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,502 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 42th largest in Campeche since 2016 (of 137 with a page). Number 129 in Mexico in 2023, of 286.
- Burnt area
- 2,502ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 4 May 2023 – 11 May 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 4 May
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 149
- in a single hotspot: 46 MW
- Danger at start
- 50
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 660MW
- 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 38 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 9.4 mm on 14 May.
This area had burned before
11% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 285 ha in 2016.
What happened to each town
-
2,515 ha reached on 27 Apr0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27 Apr | 41.8 °C | 25 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 28 Apr | 40.0 °C | 32 % | 22 km/h | 1.7 mm | High 27 |
| 29 Apr | 41.3 °C | 25 % | 50 km/h | 0.3 mm | Very high 48 |
| 30 Apr | 31.7 °C | 44 % | 35 km/h | 0.8 mm | High 24 |
| 1 May | 39.2 °C | 24 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 2 May | 41.4 °C | 23 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 3 May | 41.8 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 4 May | 40.3 °C | 27 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 5 May | 40.9 °C | 26 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 6 May | 40.2 °C | 27 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 7 May | 40.2 °C | 30 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 8 May | 39.9 °C | 28 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 9 May | 39.5 °C | 27 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 10 May | 40.4 °C | 27 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 11 May | 40.8 °C | 29 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 12 May after | 40.2 °C | 30 % | 38 km/h | 4.9 mm | High 25 |
| 13 May after | 40.6 °C | 29 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 14 May after | 31.9 °C | 51 % | 33 km/h | 9.4 mm | Very low 5 |
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 3 May 2023 the air beside the fire reached 47 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 31: 2.1 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 · 149Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 3,232 haCandelariaMarch 2023 · 17 days · 9 km away
- 2,284 haCandelariaMay 2020 · 5 days · 12 km away
- 1,793 haCandelariaApril 2019 · 7 days · 14 km away
- 2,025 haCandelaria7 May 2023 · 7 days · 23 km away
- 4,637 haSan Andrés8 April 2020 · 18 days · 36 km away
- 1,873 haSan Andrés7 April 2020 · 7 days · 40 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Candelaria fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 May 2023 and 11 May 2023: 8 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 2,502 hectares (25.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Candelaria (2,515 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 41.8 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mexico (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: 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.