Carrillo fire, March 2024 Carrillo, Santa Cruz
The fire started on 11 March 2024 in Carrillo, Costa Rica, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,066 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 36th largest in Provincia Guanacaste since 2016 (of 111 with a page). Number 3 in Costa Rica in 2024, of 12.
The power measured by the satellite is low (23.1 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
- 2,066ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 10days
- 11 Mar 2024 – 20 Mar 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- cantons
- Started on
- 11 Mar
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 76
- in a single hotspot: 23 MW
- Danger at start
- 42
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 401MW
- 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 33 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 21 Mar.
This area had burned before
100% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 744 ha in 2017, 2,036 ha in 2019, 1,868 ha in 2022, 119 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,063 ha that had burned before.
- 2,036 ha Carrillo fire, March 2019 6,612 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,868 ha Carrillo fire, February 2022 12,049 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 744 ha Carrillo fire, March 2017 4,618 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 119 ha Santa Cruz fire, February 2023 1,491 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Carrillo where it started1,620 ha reached on 11 Mar2.7 %
-
459 ha reached on 18 Mar0.3 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 Mar | 34.8 °C | 41 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 12 Mar | 34.4 °C | 42 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 13 Mar | 35.5 °C | 36 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 14 Mar | 35.5 °C | 39 % | 37 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 33 |
| 15 Mar | 35.3 °C | 41 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 16 Mar | 35.3 °C | 41 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 17 Mar | 34.6 °C | 47 % | 37 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 33 |
| 18 Mar | 34.5 °C | 43 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 19 Mar | 35.2 °C | 42 % | 33 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 30 |
| 20 Mar | 34.8 °C | 42 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 21 Mar after | 34.6 °C | 44 % | 40 km/h | 1.1 mm | High 24 |
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 23 March 2024 the air beside the fire reached 18 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO 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 · 76Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 6,612 haCarrillo21 March 2019 · 17 days · 2 km away
- 4,618 haCarrilloMarch 2017 · 22 days · 4 km away
- 5,865 haCarrilloMarch 2020 · 24 days · 10 km away
- 15,880 haCarrilloJanuary 2026 · 56 days · 11 km away
- 12,049 haCarrillo11 February 2022 · 24 days · 14 km away
- 4,354 haSanta Cruz12 February 2016 · 15 days · 28 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Carrillo fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 11 March 2024 and 20 March 2024: 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 2,066 hectares (20.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Carrillo (1,620 ha, 2.7 %); Santa Cruz (459 ha, 0.3 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 35.5 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, 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
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.