How long did the Isabela fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 June 2018 and 8 July 2018: 23 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 4,575 hectares (45.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Isabela (4,600 ha, 0.8 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 25.0 °C, humidity dropped to 65 % and gusts hit 29 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 13, class Moderate.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ecuador (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

EC · Ecuador · 2018-06-16 → 2018-07-08

Isabela fire, 16 June 2018 Isabela

Out · last detection 8 Jul 2018, 07:03 UTC

The fire started on 16 June 2018 in Isabela, Ecuador, and satellites saw it burning for 23 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,575 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

Number 2 in Ecuador in 2018, of 7.

Burnt area: 4,575ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 23days; 16 Jun 2018 – 8 Jul 2018
Municipalities hit: 1; cantons
Started on: 16 Jun; 2018
Heat detections: 455; in a single hotspot: 1,316 MW
Danger at start: 11; Low · FWI index
Energy released: 17.2GW; sum of detected power

Play back 8 Jul 2018

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Jun8 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1617182021222324252728302468

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

The weather it burned in

25°high

29km/h · peak gust

65%lowest humidity

It had gone 28 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Isabela where it started

4,600 ha reached on 16 Jun

0.8 %

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)
16 Jun	24.5 °C	65 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 11
17 Jun	23.8 °C	65 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 11
18 Jun	24.1 °C	68 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
19 Jun	23.5 °C	74 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 9
20 Jun	24.3 °C	69 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
21 Jun	23.2 °C	74 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 9
22 Jun	23.9 °C	71 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 9
23 Jun	23.2 °C	73 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 9
24 Jun	22.8 °C	73 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
25 Jun	23.4 °C	71 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
26 Jun	23.8 °C	70 %	25 km/h	0.4 mm	Low 9
27 Jun	24.0 °C	70 %	26 km/h	0.6 mm	Low 8
28 Jun	22.7 °C	77 %	26 km/h	0.1 mm	Low 9
29 Jun	24.4 °C	67 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
30 Jun	23.9 °C	69 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
1 Jul	23.4 °C	73 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 11
2 Jul	25.0 °C	67 %	26 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 12
3 Jul	24.4 °C	69 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
4 Jul	24.3 °C	66 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 13
5 Jul	23.9 °C	67 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
6 Jul	24.0 °C	66 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
7 Jul	23.4 °C	67 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 11
8 Jul	23.6 °C	74 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
9 Jul after	24.9 °C	68 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 13
10 Jul after	24.4 °C	71 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
11 Jul after	23.9 °C	68 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 13
12 Jul after	24.2 °C	67 %	25 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 11
13 Jul after	24.1 °C	69 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
14 Jul after	23.6 °C	70 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
15 Jul after	23.3 °C	71 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 13
16 Jul after	23.7 °C	71 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
17 Jul after	24.1 °C	70 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
18 Jul after	23.3 °C	63 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 9 Jun 2018

After · 15 Jul 2018

Before After

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 · 455Every 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

All fires in Ecuador ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Isabela fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 June 2018 and 8 July 2018: 23 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 4,575 hectares (45.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Isabela (4,600 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 25.0 °C, humidity dropped to 65 % and gusts hit 29 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 13, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ecuador (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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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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.

Where it burned