Lábrea fire, 6 August 2021 Lábrea
The fire started on 6 August 2021 in Lábrea, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,913 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 266th largest in Amazonas since 2016 (of 450 with a page). Number 564 in Brazil in 2021, of 814.
- Burnt area
- 3,913ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 11days
- 6 Aug 2021 – 16 Aug 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 6 Aug
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 286
- in a single hotspot: 125 MW
- Danger at start
- 30
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.5GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 30 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
86% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,056 ha in 2016, 2,349 ha in 2017, 2,478 ha in 2018, 2,788 ha in 2019, 4,350 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,383 ha that had burned before.
- 2,360 ha Lábrea fire, July 2019 14,695 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,911 ha Lábrea fire, July 2017 4,835 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,902 ha Lábrea fire, August 2018 11,450 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 973 ha Lábrea fire, July 2016 3,034 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 784 ha Lábrea fire, August 2020 3,604 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 82 ha Lábrea fire, July 2016 4,748 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
3,949 ha reached on 6 Aug0.1 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30 Jul | 28.3 °C | 28 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 31 Jul | 30.5 °C | 31 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 1 Aug | 32.5 °C | 33 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 2 Aug | 32.4 °C | 28 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 3 Aug | 32.4 °C | 32 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 4 Aug | 33.7 °C | 32 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 5 Aug | 34.8 °C | 26 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 6 Aug | 35.5 °C | 28 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 7 Aug | 35.2 °C | 29 % | 16 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 8 Aug | 36.4 °C | 27 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 9 Aug | 35.8 °C | 31 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 10 Aug | 34.2 °C | 36 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 11 Aug | 33.2 °C | 40 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 12 Aug | 31.9 °C | 38 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 13 Aug | 32.4 °C | 35 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 14 Aug | 33.6 °C | 35 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 15 Aug | 34.2 °C | 32 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 16 Aug | 36.0 °C | 30 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 17 Aug after | 35.1 °C | 36 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 18 Aug after | 34.0 °C | 42 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 19 Aug after | 35.5 °C | 31 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 20 Aug after | 33.0 °C | 47 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 21 Aug after | 35.0 °C | 41 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 22 Aug after | 34.7 °C | 43 % | 27 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 27 |
| 23 Aug after | 35.3 °C | 38 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 24 Aug after | 35.7 °C | 34 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 25 Aug after | 35.8 °C | 44 % | 35 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 32 |
| 26 Aug after | 37.0 °C | 37 % | 31 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 32 |
| 27 Aug after | 33.0 °C | 45 % | 32 km/h | 0.7 mm | High 25 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · 286Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Lábrea fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 August 2021 and 16 August 2021: 11 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 3,913 hectares (39.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Lábrea (3,949 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, 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
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.