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Intipuca fire, March 2019 Intipuca, Null, Chirilagua

Out · last detection 18 Mar 2019, 19:03 UTC

The fire started on 7 March 2019 in Intipuca, El Salvador, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,821 hectares from heat detections, spread across 5 municipalities.

It is the largest fire in Departamento de La Unión since 2016 (of 16 with a page). The largest in El Salvador in 2019, of 14.

Burnt area
4,821ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
7 Mar 2019 – 18 Mar 2019
Municipalities hit
5
municipalities
Started on
7 Mar
2019
Heat detections
256
in a single hotspot: 48 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Mar 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Mar18 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

789101112131415161718

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
53km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

It had gone 58 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

63% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,143 ha in 2016, 2,676 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,054 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Intipuca where it started
    3,726 ha reached on 7 Mar
    34 %
  2. Null
    823 ha reached on 7 Mar
    9.1 %
  3. Chirilagua
    177 ha reached on 12 Mar
    0.9 %
  4. El Carmen
    97 ha reached on 13 Mar
    0.9 %
  5. Conchagua
    27 ha
    0.1 %

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)
7 Mar 33.8 °C 33 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
8 Mar 33.8 °C 35 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
9 Mar 32.9 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
10 Mar 32.2 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Mar 33.5 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
12 Mar 33.1 °C 37 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
13 Mar 32.3 °C 38 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
14 Mar 31.9 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Mar 30.9 °C 43 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
16 Mar 33.3 °C 33 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
17 Mar 33.1 °C 35 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Mar 32.0 °C 32 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
19 Mar after 31.1 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Mar after 31.1 °C 40 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Mar after 31.2 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
22 Mar after 31.2 °C 39 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
23 Mar after 31.0 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
24 Mar after 31.2 °C 27 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
25 Mar after 32.0 °C 35 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
26 Mar after 32.8 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
27 Mar after 33.9 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
28 Mar after 33.0 °C 28 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
29 Mar after 31.0 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Mar after 30.0 °C 50 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Mar after 30.5 °C 51 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
1 Apr after 30.7 °C 47 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
2 Apr after 31.4 °C 45 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
3 Apr after 32.2 °C 43 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
4 Apr after 32.3 °C 41 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 30

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 28 Feb 2019
After · 25 Mar 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 · 256Every 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 El Salvador ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Intipuca fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 March 2019 and 18 March 2019: 12 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 4,821 hectares (48.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: Intipuca (3,726 ha, 34 %); Null (823 ha, 9.1 %); Chirilagua (177 ha, 0.9 %); El Carmen (97 ha, 0.9 %); Conchagua (27 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 33.8 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of El Salvador (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

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.

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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.

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 (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.