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Concepción fire, 21 September 2021 Concepción

Out · last detection 10 Oct 2021, 17:46 UTC

The fire started on 21 September 2021 in Concepción, Bolivia, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,098 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 304th largest in Santa Cruz since 2016 (of 834 with a page). Number 57 in Bolivia in 2021, of 155.

Burnt area
7,098ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
20days
21 Sept 2021 – 10 Oct 2021
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
21 Sept
2021
Heat detections
453
in a single hotspot: 51 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Oct 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Sept10 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

2122232425262728293012345678910

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
62km/h · peak gust
32%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 9.4 mm on 16 Oct.

This area had burned before

50% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2 ha in 2017, 1,071 ha in 2018, 3,218 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,576 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Concepción 93,392 inhabitants where it started
    7,152 ha
    0.2 %

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)
21 Sept 33.8 °C 40 % 39 km/h 0.1 mm High 35
22 Sept 33.2 °C 40 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Sept 34.6 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
24 Sept 32.7 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Sept 35.2 °C 32 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
26 Sept 35.2 °C 40 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
27 Sept 34.7 °C 42 % 37 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
28 Sept 35.0 °C 43 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Sept 35.7 °C 38 % 28 km/h 0.2 mm High 31
30 Sept 36.2 °C 41 % 48 km/h 0.3 mm High 34
1 Oct 36.4 °C 40 % 50 km/h 0.2 mm High 34
2 Oct 36.1 °C 39 % 52 km/h 0.3 mm High 38
3 Oct 33.8 °C 46 % 56 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
4 Oct 28.9 °C 49 % 38 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 21
5 Oct 31.2 °C 45 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
6 Oct 34.0 °C 35 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
7 Oct 33.4 °C 45 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Oct 36.9 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.3 mm High 32
9 Oct 34.6 °C 46 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Oct 35.8 °C 39 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Oct after 30.6 °C 59 % 35 km/h 1.3 mm Moderate 13
12 Oct after 34.4 °C 46 % 31 km/h 0.3 mm High 22
13 Oct after 35.3 °C 45 % 53 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
14 Oct after 35.4 °C 41 % 61 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Oct after 35.7 °C 42 % 62 km/h 16.4 mm Low 11
16 Oct after 23.4 °C 65 % 38 km/h 9.4 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Sept 2021
After · 17 Oct 2021

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 · 453Every 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 Bolivia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Concepción fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 September 2021 and 10 October 2021: 20 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 7,098 hectares (71.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Concepción (7,152 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 32 % and gusts hit 62 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bolivia (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: 119 · 110

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 119 · 110.

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 (Public Domain). 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.