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Cavalcante fire, 2 September 2016 Cavalcante, Minaçu

Out · last detection 9 Sept 2016, 16:24 UTC

The fire started on 2 September 2016 in Cavalcante, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,752 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 166th largest in Goiás since 2016 (of 548 with a page). Number 181 in Brazil in 2016, of 649.

Burnt area
6,752ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
2 Sept 2016 – 8 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
2 Sept
2016
Heat detections
240
in a single hotspot: 82 MW
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Sept8 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

23456789

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
45km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Cavalcante 9,583 inhabitants where it started
    6,790 ha reached on 2 Sept
    1.0 %
  2. Minaçu 27,075 inhabitants
    1 ha
    0.0 %

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)
30 Aug 35.3 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
31 Aug 35.4 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
1 Sept 36.6 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.3 mm High 35
2 Sept 35.2 °C 28 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
3 Sept 33.7 °C 29 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
4 Sept 33.7 °C 26 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Sept 34.1 °C 26 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Sept 35.2 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Sept 36.8 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
8 Sept 37.1 °C 21 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
9 Sept after 36.6 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Sept after 35.4 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
11 Sept after 34.5 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
12 Sept after 35.0 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
13 Sept after 36.1 °C 22 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
14 Sept after 37.2 °C 23 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
15 Sept after 36.6 °C 25 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Sept after 36.8 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
17 Sept after 36.1 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Sept after 35.1 °C 28 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
19 Sept after 35.1 °C 30 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
20 Sept after 36.0 °C 28 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
21 Sept after 36.1 °C 29 % 16 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Aug 2016
After · 15 Sept 2016

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 · 240Every 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 Cavalcante fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 September 2016 and 8 September 2016: 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 6,752 hectares (67.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cavalcante (6,790 ha, 1.0 %); Minaçu (1 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.1 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very 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.