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Corumbá fire, 14 July 2020 Corumbá, Ladário

Out · last detection 7 Aug 2020, 16:47 UTC

The fire started on 14 July 2020 in Corumbá, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 24 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 41,691 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 25th largest in Mato Grosso do Sul since 2016 (of 506 with a page). Number 31 in Brazil in 2020, of 957.

Burnt area
41,691ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
24days
14 Jul 2020 – 6 Aug 2020
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
14 Jul
2020
Heat detections
3,983
in a single hotspot: 286 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
47.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

7 Aug 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Jul6 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

1415161718192021222324252627282930311234567

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
54km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 16 Aug.

This area had burned before

13% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,554 ha in 2017, 4,930 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,217 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Corumbá 96,268 inhabitants where it started
    41,587 ha reached on 14 Jul
    0.6 %
  2. Ladário 21,522 inhabitants
    276 ha reached on 15 Jul
    0.8 %

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)
7 Jul 32.8 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
8 Jul 20.5 °C 66 % 48 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 14
9 Jul 22.1 °C 56 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
10 Jul 29.8 °C 46 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
11 Jul 32.5 °C 32 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
12 Jul 33.7 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
13 Jul 33.4 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.4 mm High 29
14 Jul 30.1 °C 53 % 27 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 16
15 Jul 32.0 °C 47 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
16 Jul 33.9 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
17 Jul 34.1 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
18 Jul 33.5 °C 28 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
19 Jul 33.3 °C 29 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
20 Jul 33.0 °C 29 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
21 Jul 32.6 °C 27 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
22 Jul 32.8 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
23 Jul 33.6 °C 26 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
24 Jul 33.1 °C 34 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
25 Jul 22.8 °C 44 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
26 Jul 28.1 °C 40 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
27 Jul 32.0 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
28 Jul 32.4 °C 33 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
29 Jul 22.6 °C 43 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
30 Jul 28.1 °C 36 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
31 Jul 32.3 °C 35 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Aug 34.7 °C 22 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
2 Aug 33.9 °C 21 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Aug 33.9 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
4 Aug 33.9 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Aug 33.8 °C 16 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
6 Aug 33.7 °C 21 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
7 Aug after 33.5 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
8 Aug after 34.2 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
9 Aug after 34.4 °C 17 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
10 Aug after 34.4 °C 22 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
11 Aug after 34.6 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
12 Aug after 28.6 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
13 Aug after 33.1 °C 35 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Aug after 37.1 °C 24 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
15 Aug after 36.4 °C 32 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
16 Aug after 30.8 °C 53 % 36 km/h 1.1 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Jul 2020
After · 13 Aug 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 · 3,983Every 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 Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Corumbá fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 July 2020 and 6 August 2020: 24 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 41,691 hectares (416.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Corumbá (41,587 ha, 0.6 %); Ladário (276 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.7 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Brazil (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: 193

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 193.

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.