How long did the Collipulli fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 February 2023 and 13 February 2023: 9 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 2,912 hectares (29.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Collipulli (2,209 ha, 1.7 %); Mulchén (705 ha, 0.4 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 30.4 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chile (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

CL · Chile · 2023-02-05 → 2023-02-13

Collipulli fire, 5 February 2023 Collipulli, Mulchén

Out · last detection 13 Feb 2023, 19:15 UTC

The fire started on 5 February 2023 in Collipulli, Chile, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,912 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 30th largest in Región de La Araucanía since 2016 (of 159 with a page). Number 38 in Chile in 2023, of 70.

Burnt area: 2,912ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 9days; 5 Feb 2023 – 13 Feb 2023
Municipalities hit: 2; communes
Started on: 5 Feb; 2023
Heat detections: 236; in a single hotspot: 114 MW
Danger at start: 28; High · FWI index
Energy released: 4.1GW; sum of detected power

Play back 13 Feb 2023

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 5 Feb13 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

56789111213

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

The weather it burned in

30°high

60km/h · peak gust

13%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

26% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 279 ha in 2016, 566 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 763 ha that had burned before.

377 ha Collipulli fire, February 2022 3,151 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Collipulli where it started

2,209 ha reached on 5 Feb

1.7 %
Mulchén

705 ha reached on 5 Feb

0.4 %

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)
5 Feb	29.0 °C	37 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
6 Feb	29.8 °C	33 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
7 Feb	29.7 °C	26 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
8 Feb	29.7 °C	34 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
9 Feb	30.4 °C	28 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
10 Feb	28.7 °C	36 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
11 Feb	28.3 °C	29 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
12 Feb	25.3 °C	47 %	38 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 21
13 Feb	24.4 °C	36 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
14 Feb after	23.0 °C	43 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
15 Feb after	24.3 °C	44 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
16 Feb after	21.9 °C	32 %	60 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
17 Feb after	27.9 °C	13 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 41
18 Feb after	28.7 °C	17 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
19 Feb after	27.3 °C	36 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
20 Feb after	27.3 °C	28 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
21 Feb after	28.4 °C	29 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
22 Feb after	28.7 °C	29 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
23 Feb after	29.1 °C	31 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
24 Feb after	27.1 °C	32 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
25 Feb after	22.0 °C	35 %	41 km/h	0.5 mm	High 30
26 Feb after	24.6 °C	31 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
27 Feb after	28.1 °C	29 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
28 Feb after	27.5 °C	37 %	49 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 · 29 Jan 2023

After · 20 Feb 2023

Before After

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 · Copernicus

On 5 February 2023 the air beside the fire reached 784 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 441: 29 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak784 µg/m³

Days over the guideline9 days

PM101,125 µg/m³

Optical depth5.28

WHO 15

345678910111213141516

Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 236Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Chile ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Collipulli fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 February 2023 and 13 February 2023: 9 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 2,912 hectares (29.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Collipulli (2,209 ha, 1.7 %); Mulchén (705 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 30.4 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chile (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: 130 (CONAF) · 132

CONAF · Corporación Nacional Forestal ↗
SENAPRED ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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What really happened?

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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 130 (CONAF) · 132.

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 ADM3 (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.

Where it burned