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Copo fire, 21 September 2020 Copo

Out · last detection 2 Oct 2020, 05:09 UTC

The fire started on 21 September 2020 in Copo, Argentina, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,159 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 43th largest in Santiago del Estero since 2016 (of 320 with a page). Number 196 in Argentina in 2020, of 671.

Burnt area
3,159ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
21 Sept 2020 – 1 Oct 2020
Municipalities hit
1
departments
Started on
21 Sept
2020
Heat detections
152
in a single hotspot: 431 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 Oct 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Sept1 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

21222325262728293012

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

The weather it burned in

41°high
64km/h · peak gust
10%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

30% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 932 ha in 2017, 122 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 960 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Copo where it started
    3,177 ha reached on 15 Sept
    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 25.8 °C 11 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
22 Sept 30.5 °C 10 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
23 Sept 34.6 °C 22 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
24 Sept 37.9 °C 25 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
25 Sept 40.7 °C 22 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
26 Sept 41.3 °C 22 % 51 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 67
27 Sept 27.2 °C 23 % 55 km/h 0.3 mm Extreme 62
28 Sept 28.9 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Sept 35.3 °C 23 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
30 Sept 41.1 °C 21 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
1 Oct 39.6 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
2 Oct after 28.5 °C 37 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Oct after 17.9 °C 53 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
4 Oct after 23.4 °C 41 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
5 Oct after 23.4 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
6 Oct after 29.2 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
7 Oct after 32.7 °C 28 % 39 km/h 0.5 mm High 38
8 Oct after 34.4 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Oct after 32.8 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
10 Oct after 34.8 °C 12 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
11 Oct after 35.3 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Sept 2020
After · 8 Oct 2020

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 · 152Every 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 Copo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 September 2020 and 1 October 2020: 11 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 3,159 hectares (31.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Copo (3,177 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 41.3 °C, humidity dropped to 10 % and gusts hit 64 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 71, class Very extreme.
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.