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MX · Mexico · –

Hopelchén fire, February 2023 Hopelchén

Out · last detection 2 Apr 2023, 19:32 UTC

The fire started on 24 February 2023 in Hopelchén, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 37 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 7,553 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 4th largest in Campeche since 2016 (of 124 with a page). Number 18 in Mexico in 2023, of 285.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Tekax · 2024Hopelchén · 2020Hopelchén · 2020Hopelchén · 2017

Burnt area
7,553ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
37days
24 Feb 2023 – 1 Apr 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
24 Feb
2023
Heat detections
713
in a single hotspot: 439 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Average daily power
348MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Feb1 Apr
2 Apr 2023

How it evolved, day by day

24 Feb 2023 · 30 MW · 3 25 Feb 2023 · 6 MW · 3 26 Feb 2023 · 22 MW · 5 27 Feb 2023 · 596 MW · 22 28 Feb 2023 · 41 MW · 10 1 Mar 2023 · 198 MW · 8 2 Mar 2023 · 212 MW · 13 3 Mar 2023 · 2,652 MW · 44 4 Mar 2023 · 69 MW · 32 5 Mar 2023 · 678 MW · 34 6 Mar 2023 · 282 MW · 31 7 Mar 2023 · 265 MW · 52 8 Mar 2023 · 222 MW · 41 9 Mar 2023 · 27 MW · 20 10 Mar 2023 · 175 MW · 21 11 Mar 2023 · 92 MW · 9 12 Mar 2023 · 773 MW · 76 13 Mar 2023 · 257 MW · 12 14 Mar 2023 · 136 MW · 4 15 Mar 2023 · 2 MW · 2 16 Mar 2023 · 11 MW · 3 17 Mar 2023 · 71 MW · 3 18 Mar 2023 · 2,449 MW · 70 19 Mar 2023 · 46 MW · 39 21 Mar 2023 · 136 MW · 6 22 Mar 2023 · 79 MW · 10 23 Mar 2023 · 19 MW · 2 24 Mar 2023 · 827 MW · 23 25 Mar 2023 · 52 MW · 9 26 Mar 2023 · 38 MW · 3 27 Mar 2023 · 444 MW · 11 28 Mar 2023 · 227 MW · 28 29 Mar 2023 · 137 MW · 21 30 Mar 2023 · 3 MW · 4 31 Mar 2023 · 51 MW · 4 1 Apr 2023 · 1,541 MW · 30 2 Apr 2023 · 22 MW · 5
24 Feb 3 Mar 12 Mar 21 Mar 29 Mar

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
54km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

40% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,243 ha in 2017, 2,601 ha in 2020, 746 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,986 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 4.8% of the area of London (76 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Hopelchén 42,140 inhabitants where it started
    7,870 ha reached on 24 Feb
    1.0 %

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 2025
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (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)
24 Feb 34.4 °C 33 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 Feb 31.8 °C 43 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
26 Feb 32.6 °C 43 % 39 km/h 0.4 mm High 31
27 Feb 32.4 °C 49 % 43 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
28 Feb 32.0 °C 50 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
1 Mar 34.6 °C 39 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
2 Mar 35.8 °C 39 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
3 Mar 36.2 °C 39 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
4 Mar 34.9 °C 37 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
5 Mar 34.5 °C 38 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
6 Mar 33.9 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
7 Mar 32.9 °C 40 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
8 Mar 34.2 °C 32 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
9 Mar 33.3 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Mar 34.4 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Mar 34.6 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
12 Mar 36.2 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
13 Mar 35.8 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
14 Mar 36.0 °C 34 % 31 km/h 5.3 mm High 33
15 Mar 30.6 °C 57 % 28 km/h 4.3 mm Very low 2
16 Mar 31.2 °C 50 % 34 km/h 0.9 mm Moderate 13
17 Mar 35.8 °C 39 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
18 Mar 35.3 °C 43 % 39 km/h 10.0 mm High 23
19 Mar 29.0 °C 64 % 41 km/h 8.1 mm Very low 3
20 Mar 28.5 °C 48 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very low 4
21 Mar 33.0 °C 38 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
22 Mar 33.7 °C 45 % 42 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 19
23 Mar 33.3 °C 52 % 43 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 21
24 Mar 36.0 °C 34 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
25 Mar 35.5 °C 41 % 54 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
26 Mar 35.3 °C 39 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
27 Mar 35.9 °C 35 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
28 Mar 35.2 °C 37 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
29 Mar 34.3 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
30 Mar 33.3 °C 37 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
31 Mar 33.7 °C 43 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Apr 34.5 °C 36 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
2 Apr after 35.5 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
3 Apr after 36.4 °C 33 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Apr after 36.2 °C 33 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
5 Apr after 36.4 °C 36 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Apr after 36.4 °C 35 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Apr after 36.2 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Apr after 35.2 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
9 Apr after 35.1 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
10 Apr after 35.1 °C 30 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 Apr after 34.7 °C 36 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 33

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 36.8, a minimum humidity of 33% and 12 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 20.

FWI at the start 36.8
Minimum humidity 33 %
Days without rain 12
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Tekax fire, April 2024
1,690 ha 15 days FWI 36.9 Min. humidity 30 % 20 km away, in 2024

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

15 days
median duration
2,339 ha
median area
100 %
went past 1,000 ha
1.9 mm
rain at the end (median; 14 of 20 had it)

It was 3.2 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 37 days, against 15 days.

None of its 20 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 6 of 20, 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 1.9 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
54km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 1 Apr, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 14 of 20, with a median of 1.9 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.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Feb 2023
After · 8 Apr 2023

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 · Copernicus

On 7 March 2023 the air beside the fire reached 59 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 26: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak59 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM1085 µg/m³
Optical depth0.80
26 Feb5 Mar12 Mar19 Mar26 Mar
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 · 713Every 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 Hopelchén fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 24 February 2023 to 1 April 2023 (37 days). The perimeter dates it from 28 February 2023 to 25 March 2023.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 7,553 hectares (75.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Hopelchén (7,870 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.2 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, 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.
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: 20. Their median duration was 15 days and their median area 2,339 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. None of its 20 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 6 of 20, 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 1.9 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: 911 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Area: 7,833 → 7,553 ha.

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
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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 3 polygons grouped in this page.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 28 February 2023 to 25 March 2023. 713 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.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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.