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Exaltación fire, 24 July 2017 Exaltación

Out · last detection 5 Aug 2017, 18:17 UTC

The fire started on 24 July 2017 in Exaltación, Bolivia, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,111 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 331th largest in Beni since 2016 (of 902 with a page). Number 41 in Bolivia in 2017, of 123.

Burnt area
6,111ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
24 Jul 2017 – 5 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
24 Jul
2017
Heat detections
155
in a single hotspot: 47 MW
Danger at start
29
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Aug 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Jul5 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

242526272829303112345

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
49km/h · peak gust
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 44 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 13 Aug.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 58 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Exaltación 8,012 inhabitants where it started
    6,150 ha
    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)
24 Jul 35.4 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
25 Jul 35.8 °C 34 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
26 Jul 35.1 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
27 Jul 35.3 °C 26 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
28 Jul 34.7 °C 26 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
29 Jul 34.8 °C 26 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
30 Jul 34.4 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
31 Jul 35.1 °C 30 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
1 Aug 35.6 °C 30 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Aug 36.4 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Aug 27.4 °C 41 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
4 Aug 30.9 °C 43 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Aug 33.1 °C 41 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
6 Aug after 35.4 °C 35 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
7 Aug after 36.5 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
8 Aug after 36.7 °C 37 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
9 Aug after 36.5 °C 37 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
10 Aug after 36.0 °C 43 % 37 km/h 0.4 mm High 35
11 Aug after 34.8 °C 47 % 48 km/h 0.7 mm High 30
12 Aug after 34.6 °C 46 % 54 km/h 0.7 mm High 30
13 Aug after 35.5 °C 41 % 43 km/h 1.6 mm High 25

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Jul 2017
After · 12 Aug 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 · 155Every 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 Bolivia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Exaltación fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 July 2017 and 5 August 2017: 13 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 6,111 hectares (61.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Exaltación (6,150 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bolivia (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: 119 · 110

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 119 · 110.

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 ADM3 (Public Domain). 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.