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Carrillo fire, 5 March 2019 Carrillo, Santa Cruz

Out · last detection 10 Mar 2019, 19:52 UTC

The fire started on 5 March 2019 in Carrillo, Costa Rica, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,151 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 87th largest in Provincia Guanacaste since 2016 (of 111 with a page). Number 13 in Costa Rica in 2019, of 16.

The power measured by the satellite is low (12.5 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
1,151ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
5 Mar 2019 – 11 Mar 2019
Municipalities hit
2
cantons
Started on
5 Mar
2019
Heat detections
45
in a single hotspot: 12 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Energy released
187MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Mar 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Mar11 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

5678910

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
70km/h · peak gust
40%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

37% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 110 ha in 2016, 273 ha in 2017, 87 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 428 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Carrillo where it started
    729 ha reached on 27 Feb
    1.2 %
  2. Santa Cruz
    429 ha reached on 3 Mar
    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)
5 Mar 33.0 °C 40 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
6 Mar 31.8 °C 40 % 70 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
7 Mar 31.6 °C 45 % 70 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
8 Mar 32.3 °C 40 % 68 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
9 Mar 32.3 °C 41 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
10 Mar 32.6 °C 45 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Mar 32.6 °C 48 % 61 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
12 Mar after 32.9 °C 43 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
13 Mar after 32.8 °C 39 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Mar after 34.3 °C 37 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Mar after 33.6 °C 41 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Mar after 31.8 °C 46 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
17 Mar after 31.9 °C 48 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
18 Mar after 32.0 °C 42 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
19 Mar after 34.6 °C 40 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Mar after 33.4 °C 44 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Mar after 32.9 °C 44 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Feb 2019
After · 18 Mar 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 · 45Every 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 Costa Rica ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Carrillo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 March 2019 and 11 March 2019: 7 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 1,151 hectares (11.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Carrillo (729 ha, 1.2 %); Santa Cruz (429 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.0 °C, humidity dropped to 40 % and gusts hit 70 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Costa Rica (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
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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 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 (CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication). 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.