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Itaituba fire, 21 August 2024 Itaituba, Altamira

Out · last detection 23 Sept 2024, 04:38 UTC

The fire started on 21 August 2024 in Itaituba, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 34 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 38,122 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 45th largest in Pará since 2016 (of 1096 with a page). Number 74 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

Burnt area
38,122ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
34days
21 Aug 2024 – 23 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
21 Aug
2024
Heat detections
2,957
in a single hotspot: 234 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
24.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

23 Sept 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Aug23 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

21222324252627282930311234567891011121314151617181920212223

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
41km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 12.6 mm on 24 Sept.

This area had burned before

44% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,426 ha in 2016, 2,302 ha in 2017, 3,122 ha in 2018, 7,174 ha in 2019, 8,192 ha in 2020, 5,389 ha in 2021, 7,636 ha in 2022, 4,256 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 16,706 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Itaituba 123,314 inhabitants where it started
    35,289 ha reached on 14 Aug
    0.6 %
  2. Altamira 126,279 inhabitants
    3,099 ha reached on 17 Aug
    0.0 %

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)
14 Aug 31.9 °C 46 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 24
15 Aug 31.5 °C 51 % 41 km/h 16.6 mm Very low 4
16 Aug 32.8 °C 35 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
17 Aug 33.7 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
18 Aug 32.3 °C 45 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
19 Aug 32.6 °C 39 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
20 Aug 33.2 °C 35 % 29 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
21 Aug 33.7 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
22 Aug 33.6 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
23 Aug 32.9 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
24 Aug 31.2 °C 53 % 34 km/h 2.2 mm Low 9
25 Aug 32.9 °C 35 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
26 Aug 31.9 °C 43 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
27 Aug 32.2 °C 43 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
28 Aug 32.8 °C 46 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
29 Aug 32.2 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
30 Aug 32.6 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
31 Aug 33.3 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
1 Sept 33.3 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
2 Sept 33.6 °C 32 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Sept 32.6 °C 42 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
4 Sept 34.3 °C 30 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
5 Sept 34.3 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Sept 34.1 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
7 Sept 33.3 °C 36 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Sept 31.8 °C 47 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
9 Sept 32.7 °C 41 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
10 Sept 32.9 °C 38 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
11 Sept 33.6 °C 39 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
12 Sept 33.5 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Sept 33.3 °C 42 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
14 Sept 33.6 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
15 Sept 33.3 °C 41 % 33 km/h 0.9 mm High 25
16 Sept 34.1 °C 37 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
17 Sept 34.1 °C 43 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
18 Sept 34.1 °C 41 % 38 km/h 2.2 mm Moderate 15
19 Sept 32.7 °C 44 % 36 km/h 5.2 mm Low 6
20 Sept 34.3 °C 36 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
21 Sept 33.2 °C 42 % 29 km/h 0.1 mm High 23
22 Sept 33.5 °C 45 % 23 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 21
23 Sept 31.7 °C 53 % 26 km/h 0.4 mm High 22
24 Sept after 31.5 °C 57 % 26 km/h 12.6 mm Very low 2

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Aug 2024
After · 30 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 4 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 422 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 224: 15 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak422 µg/m³
Days over the guideline39 days
PM10604 µg/m³
Optical depth2.60
192021222324252627282930311234567891011121314151617181920212223242526
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 · 2,957Every 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 Itaituba fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 August 2024 and 23 September 2024: 34 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 38,122 hectares (381.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Itaituba (35,289 ha, 0.6 %); Altamira (3,099 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
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.