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Escárcega fire, 18 April 2019 Escárcega

Out · last detection 2 May 2019, 20:01 UTC

The fire started on 18 April 2019 in Escárcega, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,894 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 24th largest in Campeche since 2016 (of 137 with a page). Number 90 in Mexico in 2019, of 364.

Burnt area
3,894ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
18 Apr 2019 – 1 May 2019
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
18 Apr
2019
Heat detections
348
in a single hotspot: 46 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

2 May 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Apr1 May

How it evolved, day by day

18192021222324252628293012

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
60km/h · peak gust
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.8 mm on 17 May.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,011 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Escárcega 59,923 inhabitants where it started
    3,917 ha reached on 18 Apr
    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)
18 Apr 39.4 °C 34 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Apr 31.7 °C 44 % 60 km/h 0.9 mm High 26
20 Apr 32.9 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
21 Apr 36.7 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
22 Apr 37.6 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
23 Apr 37.5 °C 31 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
24 Apr 38.6 °C 27 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
25 Apr 40.0 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Apr 35.5 °C 43 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
27 Apr 33.4 °C 53 % 21 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 21
28 Apr 38.1 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
29 Apr 37.9 °C 35 % 44 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 40
30 Apr 37.5 °C 35 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 May 38.3 °C 33 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
2 May after 37.6 °C 35 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 May after 37.8 °C 36 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 May after 39.1 °C 38 % 39 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 40
5 May after 39.2 °C 35 % 32 km/h 6.1 mm Moderate 15
6 May after 36.8 °C 45 % 35 km/h 2.7 mm Moderate 13
7 May after 39.7 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 May after 40.3 °C 33 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
9 May after 41.5 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
10 May after 40.5 °C 31 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
11 May after 38.1 °C 40 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 May after 39.1 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
13 May after 40.5 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 May after 39.6 °C 29 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
15 May after 38.9 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
16 May after 40.4 °C 32 % 26 km/h 0.3 mm High 34
17 May after 39.4 °C 31 % 33 km/h 1.8 mm High 26

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Apr 2019
After · 8 May 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 · 348Every 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 Escárcega fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 April 2019 and 1 May 2019: 14 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 3,894 hectares (38.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Escárcega (3,917 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.0 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.
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.