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Jala fire, 7 May 2023 Jala, Ixtlán del Río

Out · last detection 11 May 2023, 20:42 UTC

The fire started on 7 May 2023 in Jala, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,732 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 148th largest in Nayarit since 2016 (of 179 with a page). Number 230 in Mexico in 2023, of 286.

Burnt area
1,732ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
7 May 2023 – 10 May 2023
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
7 May
2023
Heat detections
69
in a single hotspot: 114 MW
Danger at start
48
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.2GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 May 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 May10 May

How it evolved, day by day

781011

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
59km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.3 mm on 14 May.

This area had burned before

64% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1 ha in 2016, 1,106 ha in 2018.

What happened to each town

  1. Jala where it started
    1,312 ha reached on 4 May
    2.6 %
  2. Ixtlán del Río
    427 ha reached on 7 May
    0.9 %

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.

Official record

According to CONAFOR, this fire started on 6 May 2023 and burned 1,212 ha (the satellite measured 1,732 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

CONAFOR (Comisión Nacional Forestal), estadística de incendios forestales en datos.gob.mx (CC BY 4.0). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

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 May 31.5 °C 19 % 49 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 48
8 May 30.9 °C 18 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
9 May 31.0 °C 15 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
10 May 30.0 °C 16 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 May after 29.8 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
12 May after 29.3 °C 14 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
13 May after 29.2 °C 14 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
14 May after 29.4 °C 20 % 48 km/h 1.3 mm High 31

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Apr 2023
After · 17 May 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 8 May 2023 the air beside the fire reached 27 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak27 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1038 µg/m³
Optical depth0.50
5678910111213
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 · 69Every 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 Jala fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 May 2023 and 10 May 2023: 4 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 1,732 hectares (17.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Jala (1,312 ha, 2.6 %); Ixtlán del Río (427 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.5 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 59 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 51, class Extreme.
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.

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.

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.

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.