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Durango fire, April 2019 Durango, Mezquital

Out · last detection 27 May 2019, 09:21 UTC

The fire started on 26 April 2019 in Durango, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 32 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 38,155 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Durango since 2016 (of 241 with a page). The largest in Mexico in 2019, of 364.

Burnt area
38,155ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
32days
26 Apr 2019 – 27 May 2019
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
26 Apr
2019
Heat detections
2,695
in a single hotspot: 245 MW
Danger at start
49
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
39.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

27 May 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Apr27 May

How it evolved, day by day

262728293012456789101112131415161718192021222324252627

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

The weather it burned in

24°high
82km/h · peak gust
4%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 11.6 mm on 1 Jun.

This area had burned before

0% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 184 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Durango 518,709 inhabitants where it started
    23,893 ha reached on 26 Apr
    2.6 %
  2. Mezquital
    14,443 ha reached on 4 May
    1.7 %

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.

Official record

According to CONAFOR, this fire started on 26 April 2019 and burned 23,809 ha (the satellite measured 38,155 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

CONAFOR (Comisión Nacional Forestal), estadística de incendios forestales en datos.gob.mx (CC BY 4.0). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

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)
26 Apr 23.0 °C 9 % 52 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 49
27 Apr 22.5 °C 7 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
28 Apr 21.5 °C 15 % 54 km/h 1.1 mm High 32
29 Apr 20.8 °C 16 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Apr 20.7 °C 11 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
1 May 21.6 °C 12 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
2 May 23.6 °C 7 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
3 May 19.4 °C 12 % 69 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
4 May 22.0 °C 9 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
5 May 20.8 °C 11 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
6 May 20.5 °C 9 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
7 May 21.6 °C 6 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
8 May 20.8 °C 6 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
9 May 21.5 °C 11 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
10 May 19.9 °C 14 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
11 May 18.6 °C 17 % 71 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 May 17.0 °C 19 % 82 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
13 May 19.8 °C 6 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
14 May 22.6 °C 4 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
15 May 23.8 °C 5 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
16 May 23.0 °C 4 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
17 May 21.1 °C 7 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
18 May 20.9 °C 6 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
19 May 24.1 °C 7 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
20 May 22.6 °C 6 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
21 May 22.6 °C 6 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
22 May 23.6 °C 6 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
23 May 22.7 °C 12 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
24 May 24.4 °C 13 % 46 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 50
25 May 24.2 °C 15 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
26 May 23.5 °C 20 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
27 May 21.9 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.5 mm High 36
28 May after 21.4 °C 24 % 55 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 42
29 May after 23.1 °C 11 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
30 May after 24.4 °C 14 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
31 May after 23.1 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 40
1 Jun after 21.5 °C 36 % 40 km/h 11.6 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 19 Apr 2019
After · 3 Jun 2019

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 · 2,695Every 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 Mexico ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Durango fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 26 April 2019 and 27 May 2019: 32 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 38,155 hectares (381.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Durango (23,893 ha, 2.6 %); Mezquital (14,443 ha, 1.7 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 24.4 °C, humidity dropped to 4 % and gusts hit 82 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mexico (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

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.

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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 911.

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 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)). 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.