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Formosa fire, December 2019 Formosa

Out · last detection 11 Dec 2019, 18:26 UTC

The fire started on 10 December 2019 in Formosa, Argentina, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,580 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 561th largest in Formosa since 2016 (of 620 with a page). Number 145 in Argentina in 2019, of 158.

Burnt area
1,580ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
2days
10 Dec 2019 – 11 Dec 2019
Municipalities hit
1
departments
Started on
10 Dec
2019
Heat detections
36
in a single hotspot: 102 MW
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Energy released
587MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Dec 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 10 Dec11 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

1011

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
28km/h · peak gust
31%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.2 mm on 15 Dec.

This area had burned before

90% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 822 ha in 2016, 1,300 ha in 2018. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,429 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Formosa where it started
    1,584 ha reached on 10 Dec
    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)
10 Dec 33.8 °C 41 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
11 Dec 36.9 °C 31 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
12 Dec after 33.4 °C 54 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 16
13 Dec after 35.3 °C 40 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
14 Dec after 38.0 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
15 Dec after 33.5 °C 50 % 77 km/h 5.2 mm Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 3 Dec 2019
After · 18 Dec 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 · 36Every 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 Formosa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 10 December 2019 and 11 December 2019: 2 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 1,580 hectares (15.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Formosa (1,584 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 28 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 16, class Moderate.
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.