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Guiratinga fire, August 2020 Guiratinga

Out · last detection 13 Sept 2020, 16:54 UTC

The fire started on 29 August 2020 in Guiratinga, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 14,354 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 289th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 119 in Brazil in 2020, of 957.

Burnt area
14,354ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
29 Aug 2020 – 13 Sept 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
29 Aug
2020
Heat detections
531
in a single hotspot: 125 MW
Danger at start
50
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
4.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

13 Sept 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Aug13 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

293031123456789111213

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
47km/h · peak gust
6%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.5 mm on 22 Sept.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Guiratinga 10,966 inhabitants where it started
    14,434 ha reached on 29 Aug
    2.8 %

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)
29 Aug 35.7 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
30 Aug 36.4 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
31 Aug 36.8 °C 17 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
1 Sept 36.3 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
2 Sept 34.9 °C 16 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
3 Sept 34.9 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
4 Sept 35.2 °C 15 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
5 Sept 35.4 °C 12 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
6 Sept 36.3 °C 6 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
7 Sept 37.0 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
8 Sept 37.4 °C 16 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
9 Sept 37.3 °C 12 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
10 Sept 37.9 °C 13 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
11 Sept 37.0 °C 7 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
12 Sept 37.0 °C 6 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
13 Sept 36.4 °C 9 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 69
14 Sept after 36.3 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
15 Sept after 36.3 °C 14 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
16 Sept after 36.5 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
17 Sept after 36.8 °C 18 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
18 Sept after 37.2 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
19 Sept after 38.6 °C 17 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Sept after 34.3 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
21 Sept after 33.8 °C 33 % 28 km/h 0.8 mm High 31
22 Sept after 29.9 °C 47 % 29 km/h 5.5 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Aug 2020
After · 20 Sept 2020

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 · 531Every 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 Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Guiratinga fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 August 2020 and 13 September 2020: 16 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 14,354 hectares (143.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Guiratinga (14,434 ha, 2.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.9 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 69, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Brazil (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: 193

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 193.

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.