Cintalapa fire, 23 April 2023 Cintalapa, Santa María Chimalapa
The fire started on 23 April 2023 in Cintalapa, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,504 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 46th largest in Chiapas since 2016 (of 267 with a page). Number 78 in Mexico in 2023, of 285.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 3,504ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 14days
- 23 Apr 2023 – 6 May 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 23 Apr
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 196
- in a single hotspot: 100 MW
- Danger at start
- 16
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 91MW
- detected power per day, on average
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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.2 mm on 9 May.
This area had burned before
72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,275 ha in 2016, 382 ha in 2017, 1,154 ha in 2019, 1,348 ha in 2021, 87 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,534 ha that had burned before.
- 2,068 ha Cintalapa fire, April 2016 3,990 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 944 ha Cintalapa fire, April 2021 2,146 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 713 ha Cintalapa fire, May 2019 3,349 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 415 ha Cintalapa fire, April 2019 3,424 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 246 ha Santa María Chimalapa fire, February 2017 1,795 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 133 ha Cintalapa fire, April 2017 5,760 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 87 ha Cintalapa fire, May 2022 3,902 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3 ha Cintalapa fire, April 2017 3,294 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Cintalapa where it started3,207 ha reached on 23 Apr1.3 %
-
317 ha reached on 5 May0.1 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
Several official records match this area
According to CONAFOR, 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 2,171 ha (the satellite measured 3,504 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.
CONAFOR records each fire that started at a different time or place separately; the satellite sees a single burned area, so this page groups them together. The numbers on the map show where each one started.
- 1 Cintalapa Palo Herrado/ El Tesoro 22 April 2023 1,748 ha · extinguished on 30 April 2023 · cause: negligence
- 2 Cintalapa Ejido Plan De Guadalupe/ El Balazo 1 May 2023 422 ha · extinguished on 6 May 2023 · cause: unknown
Total according to CONAFOR: 2,171 ha, 62 % of the 3,504 ha in the satellite perimeter.
CONAFOR (Comisión Nacional Forestal), estadística de incendios forestales en datos.gob.mx (CC BY 4.0). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Apr | 30.0 °C | 50 % | 49 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 24 Apr | 29.0 °C | 47 % | 36 km/h | 1.6 mm | Low 9 |
| 25 Apr | 31.5 °C | 36 % | 33 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 26 Apr | 30.4 °C | 36 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 27 Apr | 29.2 °C | 42 % | 60 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 28 Apr | 30.5 °C | 32 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 29 Apr | 30.3 °C | 36 % | 55 km/h | 2.8 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 30 Apr | 24.2 °C | 55 % | 51 km/h | 1.7 mm | Low 8 |
| 1 May | 31.9 °C | 37 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 2 May | 31.0 °C | 44 % | 50 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 22 |
| 3 May | 32.0 °C | 43 % | 33 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 4 May | 30.8 °C | 47 % | 35 km/h | 1.8 mm | Low 10 |
| 5 May | 32.8 °C | 41 % | 26 km/h | 0.4 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 6 May | 32.1 °C | 41 % | 28 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 7 May after | 32.7 °C | 38 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 8 May after | 32.1 °C | 46 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 9 May after | 31.9 °C | 51 % | 25 km/h | 4.2 mm | Very low 4 |
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 5 May 2023 the air beside the fire reached 108 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 68: 4.6 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 · 196Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Cintalapa fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 April 2023 and 6 May 2023: 14 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 3,504 hectares (35.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cintalapa (3,207 ha, 1.3 %); Santa María Chimalapa (317 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 32.8 °C, humidity dropped to 32 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 28, class High.
- 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 196 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with CONAFOR: 2,171 official ha against 3,504 ha of perimeter; similar, but with reservations.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.