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Itacajá fire, September 2024 Itacajá

Out · last detection 15 Sept 2024, 16:25 UTC

The fire started on 6 September 2024 in Itacajá, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,909 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 844th largest in Tocantins since 2016 (of 1242 with a page). Number 935 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

Burnt area
3,909ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
6 Sept 2024 – 14 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
6 Sept
2024
Heat detections
134
in a single hotspot: 74 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

15 Sept 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Sept14 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

6789101112131415

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
46km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

61% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,179 ha in 2017, 1,463 ha in 2020, 5 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,388 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Itacajá 6,819 inhabitants where it started
    3,934 ha reached on 6 Sept
    1.3 %

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)
31 Aug 36.2 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
1 Sept 37.1 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
2 Sept 37.7 °C 16 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
3 Sept 37.2 °C 21 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
4 Sept 39.2 °C 11 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
5 Sept 38.7 °C 12 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
6 Sept 38.0 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
7 Sept 38.1 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
8 Sept 38.1 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
9 Sept 37.1 °C 21 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
10 Sept 37.2 °C 21 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
11 Sept 38.0 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
12 Sept 38.1 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
13 Sept 38.2 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
14 Sept 37.7 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
15 Sept after 38.2 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
16 Sept after 38.1 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
17 Sept after 39.3 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
18 Sept after 39.1 °C 20 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Sept after 38.1 °C 21 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 Sept after 38.5 °C 21 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
21 Sept after 38.8 °C 21 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
22 Sept after 39.0 °C 21 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
23 Sept after 39.6 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Sept after 36.3 °C 36 % 30 km/h 0.1 mm High 37
25 Sept after 31.9 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.6 mm High 31
26 Sept after 37.0 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Aug 2024
After · 21 Sept 2024

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 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 60 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 36: 2.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak60 µg/m³
Days over the guideline3 days
PM1087 µg/m³
Optical depth0.61
4567891011121314151617
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 · 134Every 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 Itacajá fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 September 2024 and 14 September 2024: 9 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 3,909 hectares (39.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Itacajá (3,934 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.2 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, 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.