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Conesa fire, 12 March 2017 Conesa

Out · last detection 14 Mar 2017, 05:51 UTC

The fire started on 12 March 2017 in Conesa, Argentina, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,767 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 13th largest in Río Negro since 2016 (of 97 with a page). Number 23 in Argentina in 2017, of 256.

Burnt area
8,767ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
2days
12 Mar 2017 – 13 Mar 2017
Municipalities hit
1
departments
Started on
12 Mar
2017
Heat detections
314
in a single hotspot: 400 MW
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Energy released
11.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Mar 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Mar13 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

121314

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

The weather it burned in

26°high
48km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

3% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 285 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Conesa where it started
    8,748 ha reached on 12 Mar
    0.9 %

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)
12 Mar 23.1 °C 24 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Mar 25.9 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
14 Mar after 32.0 °C 35 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
15 Mar after 23.6 °C 31 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Mar after 22.7 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
17 Mar after 26.8 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
18 Mar after 29.9 °C 27 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Mar after 29.8 °C 32 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Mar after 28.2 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
21 Mar after 28.8 °C 33 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
22 Mar after 29.4 °C 32 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
23 Mar after 31.9 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Mar 2017
After · 20 Mar 2017

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 · 314Every 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 Argentina ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Conesa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 March 2017 and 13 March 2017: 2 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 8,767 hectares (87.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Conesa (8,748 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 25.9 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Argentina (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 · 100

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 911 · 100.

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.