Burned area
satellite only5,434ha
Union of 2 GWIS (Copernicus) perimeters: overlapping areas count once.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 6 Feb 2025 – 12 Feb 2025
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
CL · Chile · –
Galvarino fire, 6 February 2025 Galvarino, Lumaco
Out · last detection 12 Feb 2025, 19:27 UTC
The fire started on 6 February 2025 in Galvarino, Chile, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,434 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 12th largest in Región de La Araucanía since 2016 (of 132 with a page). Number 2 in Chile in 2025, of 33.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only7days
6 Feb 2025 to 12 Feb 2025: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 12 Feb 2025, 19:27 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only6 Feb 2025
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 6 Feb 2025
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only364
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 304 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 6 Feb 2025 – 12 Feb 2025
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only4,595MW
Total radiative power on 9 February 2025; hotspots that day: 71.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 9 Feb 2025
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model23.5FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 13.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 6 Feb 2025, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model29.9°C · 23% RH
High of 29.9 °C and minimum humidity of 23% on 9 February 2025; gusts of 52 km/h on 10 February 2025.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 6 Feb 2025 – 12 Feb 2025
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
Living inside
model≈ 450people
Estimated residents inside the perimeter and 11 ha of built-up area (100 m grid, epoch 2025).
- Source
- GHSL R2023A · JRC
- Date
- calculated on 24 October 2026
+− cross-check
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 5,452 ha
- Dates
- 6 Feb 2025 – 12 Feb 2025
- Name
- Galvarino
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/galvarino-2025-02?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire galvarino-2025-02.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-02-06 | 9 | 405 | 25.2 | 9.9 | 40 | 18 | 42.5 | 0 | 23.5 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-07 | 32 | 211 | 26.1 | 9.2 | 37 | 20 | 44.6 | 0 | 26.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-08 | 43 | 346 | 27.4 | 12.4 | 38 | 17.1 | 40.3 | 0 | 25 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-09 | 71 | 4,595 | 29.9 | 9.8 | 23 | 19.1 | 41 | 0 | 35.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-10 | 68 | 474 | 22.9 | 12.4 | 40 | 24.4 | 52.2 | 0.2 | 33.7 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-11 | 114 | 3,146 | 21.5 | 6.9 | 38 | 23.1 | 49.7 | 0 | 32 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-12 | 27 | 86 | 22.3 | 6.3 | 42 | 19.6 | 43.9 | 0 | 28.1 | alto | 1 |
| 2025-02-13 | 0 | 0 | 21.9 | 6.5 | 42 | 18.1 | 40.7 | 0 | 26.9 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-14 | 0 | 0 | 21.3 | 9.6 | 52 | 16.3 | 37.8 | 0 | 22.3 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-15 | 0 | 0 | 20.9 | 10.1 | 52 | 18.4 | 40.7 | 0 | 22.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-16 | 0 | 0 | 21.7 | 7.9 | 44 | 19.7 | 43.2 | 0 | 23.9 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-17 | 0 | 0 | 22.8 | 9.1 | 39 | 20.3 | 46.4 | 0 | 26.1 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-18 | 0 | 0 | 27.5 | 8.8 | 42 | 20.2 | 46.4 | 0 | 27.1 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-19 | 0 | 0 | 22.8 | 10.3 | 45 | 17.2 | 34.2 | 0 | 25.4 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-20 | 0 | 0 | 21 | 9.2 | 50 | 15.6 | 34.6 | 0 | 22.9 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-21 | 0 | 0 | 25.1 | 8.3 | 37 | 17.9 | 37.4 | 0 | 26.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2025-02-22 | 0 | 0 | 25.8 | 8.5 | 51 | 15.7 | 36 | 0 | 24.4 | alto | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 5,434ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 6 Feb 2025 – 12 Feb 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- communes
- Started on
- 6 Feb
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 364
- in a single hotspot: 304 MW
- Danger at start
- 24
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 1.3GW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
6 Feb12 Feb
12 Feb 2025
How it evolved, day by day
6 Feb
9 Feb
12 Feb
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
30°high
52km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity
It had gone 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
49% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 208 ha in 2019, 425 ha in 2021, 698 ha in 2022, 1,492 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,672 ha that had burned before.
- 1,489 ha Galvarino fire, February 2023 10,252 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 48 ha Galvarino fire, February 2022 1,168 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3 ha Lumaco fire, January 2023 16,772 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Galvarino where it started5,319 ha reached on 6 Feb9.4 %
-
139 ha reached on 9 Feb0.1 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Built-up area11 ha
Residents≈ 450
Inside the perimeter there were about 11 hectares of built-up land and about 450 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 Feb | 25.2 °C | 40 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 7 Feb | 26.1 °C | 37 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 8 Feb | 27.4 °C | 38 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 9 Feb | 29.9 °C | 23 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 10 Feb | 22.9 °C | 40 % | 52 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 34 |
| 11 Feb | 21.5 °C | 38 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 12 Feb | 22.3 °C | 42 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 13 Feb after | 21.9 °C | 42 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 14 Feb after | 21.3 °C | 52 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 15 Feb after | 20.9 °C | 52 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 16 Feb after | 21.7 °C | 44 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 17 Feb after | 22.8 °C | 39 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 18 Feb after | 27.5 °C | 42 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 19 Feb after | 22.8 °C | 45 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 20 Feb after | 21.0 °C | 50 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 21 Feb after | 25.1 °C | 37 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 22 Feb after | 25.8 °C | 51 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 23.5, a minimum humidity of 40% and 13 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 15.
FWI at the start
23.5
Minimum humidity
40 %
Days without rain
13
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Galvarino fire, 6 February 2025
5,434 ha
7 days
FWI 23.5
Min. humidity 40 %
Los Sauces fire, February 2022
5,249 ha
8 days
FWI 23.4
Min. humidity 39 %
33 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 4.4 mm on 24 Feb.
Traiguén fire, February 2022
1,227 ha
2 days
FWI 23.4
Min. humidity 41 %
34 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.8 mm on 24 Feb.
Traiguén fire, February 2022
1,151 ha
4 days
FWI 23.2
Min. humidity 38 %
46 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 11.1 mm on 23 Feb.
Mulchén fire, February 2022
1,629 ha
7 days
FWI 21.7
Min. humidity 41 %
102 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.4 mm on 22 Feb.
Traiguén fire, March 2020
2,282 ha
8 days
FWI 23.6
Min. humidity 44 %
20 km away, in 2020
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
What happened to them
- 4 days
- median duration
- 1,673 ha
- median area
- 100 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 4.1 mm
- rain at the end (median; 10 of 15 had it)
It was 3.2 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 7 days, against 4 days.
Only 1 of its 15 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 5 of 15, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.1 mm.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
—first rain
—no rain in ten days
52km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 12 Feb, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 10 of 15, with a median of 4.1 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 30 Jan 2025
After · 19 Feb 2025
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 12 February 2025 the air beside the fire reached 55 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak55 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM1056 µg/m³
Optical depth0.41
WHO 15
4 Feb7 Feb10 Feb13 Feb
Good
Fair
Moderate
Poor
Very poor
Extremely poor
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 364Every 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 time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 10,252 haGalvarino3 February 2023 · 7 days · 7 km away
- 16,772 haLumacoJanuary 2023 · 14 days · 11 km away
- 9,086 haLumaco2 February 2023 · 8 days · 20 km away
- 10,116 haGalvarino7 February 2022 · 15 days · 25 km away
- 12,385 haTraiguénMarch 2025 · 7 days · 31 km away
- 7,678 haLumaco1 February 2023 · 11 days · 36 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Galvarino fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 February 2025 to 12 February 2025 (7 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 February 2025 to 11 February 2025.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 5,434 hectares (54.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Galvarino (5,319 ha, 9.4 %); Lumaco (139 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 29.9 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chile (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 15. Their median duration was 4 days and their median area 1,673 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 1 of its 15 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 5 of 15, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 4.1 mm.
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: 130 (CONAF) · 132 · Emergency number and official warnings
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 6 February 2025 to 11 February 2025. 364 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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 (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.