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La Primavera fire, 13 March 2018 La Primavera

Out · last detection 17 Mar 2018, 05:38 UTC

The fire started on 13 March 2018 in La Primavera, Colombia, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,756 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 77th largest in Vichada since 2016 (of 392 with a page). Number 2 in Colombia in 2018, of 28.

Burnt area
3,756ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
13 Mar 2018 – 16 Mar 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
13 Mar
2018
Heat detections
121
in a single hotspot: 30 MW
Danger at start
21
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
575MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Mar 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Mar16 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

1314151617

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
44km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 10.6 mm on 22 Mar.

This area had burned before

45% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,688 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. La Primavera where it started
    3,784 ha reached on 13 Mar
    0.2 %

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)
13 Mar 36.0 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
14 Mar 37.1 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
15 Mar 36.7 °C 32 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
16 Mar 36.1 °C 30 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
17 Mar after 36.2 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
18 Mar after 36.3 °C 33 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
19 Mar after 36.6 °C 27 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
20 Mar after 36.9 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
21 Mar after 35.9 °C 39 % 33 km/h 0.2 mm High 24
22 Mar after 34.9 °C 44 % 40 km/h 10.6 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Mar 2018
After · 23 Mar 2018

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 · 121Every 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 Colombia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the La Primavera fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 13 March 2018 and 16 March 2018: 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 3,756 hectares (37.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered La Primavera (3,784 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.1 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Colombia (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: 123 · 119

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 123 · 119.

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 International (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.