How long did the Luciara fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 12 September 2026 to 1 October 2026 (20 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 September 2026 to 26 September 2026.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,986 hectares (39.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Santa Terezinha (2,523 ha, 0.4 %); Luciara (1,490 ha, 0.4 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, 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.

BR · Brazil · 2026-09-12 → 2026-10-01

Luciara fire, 12 September 2026 Santa Terezinha, Luciara

Out · last detection 1 Oct 2026, 17:09 UTC

The fire started on 12 September 2026 in Luciara, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 20 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,986 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 1418th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 509 in Brazil in 2026, of 769.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Santa Terezinha · 2024 Lagoa da Confusão · 2019

Burnt area: 3,986ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 20days; 12 Sept 2026 – 1 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit: 2; municipalities
Started on: 12 Sept; 2026
Heat detections: 131; in a single hotspot: 158 MW
Danger at start: 38; Very high · FWI index
Average daily power: 371MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Sept1 Oct

Play back 1 Oct 2026

How it evolved, day by day

12 Sept 14 Sept 19 Sept 21 Sept 23 Sept 26 Sept 1 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

40°high

54km/h · peak gust

18%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 8.1 mm on 2 Oct.

This area had burned before

20% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 184 ha in 2016, 105 ha in 2017, 107 ha in 2020, 51 ha in 2021, 567 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 802 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 2.5% of the area of London (40 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

Santa Terezinha 7,596 inhabitants

2,523 ha reached on 13 Sept

0.4 %
Luciara 2,509 inhabitants where it started

1,490 ha reached on 12 Sept

0.4 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2025

Built-up area0.16 ha

Residents≈ 80

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.16 hectares of built-up land and about 80 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
12 Sept	38.5 °C	23 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
13 Sept	40.3 °C	18 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
14 Sept	39.2 °C	25 %	24 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
15 Sept	37.8 °C	34 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
16 Sept	37.7 °C	35 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
17 Sept	37.4 °C	35 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
18 Sept	38.8 °C	19 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
19 Sept	38.9 °C	21 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
20 Sept	37.9 °C	22 %	54 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 57
21 Sept	38.3 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
22 Sept	39.5 °C	24 %	20 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
23 Sept	38.9 °C	31 %	31 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 43
24 Sept	38.4 °C	33 %	27 km/h	0.3 mm	Very high 38
25 Sept	34.5 °C	42 %	32 km/h	0.2 mm	High 32
26 Sept	36.3 °C	38 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
27 Sept	38.0 °C	33 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 31
28 Sept	38.5 °C	31 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
29 Sept	38.1 °C	29 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
30 Sept	36.8 °C	33 %	30 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
1 Oct	39.0 °C	31 %	26 km/h	0.4 mm	High 37
2 Oct after	29.6 °C	63 %	34 km/h	8.1 mm	Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 5 Sept 2026

After · 8 Oct 2026

Before After

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 22 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 260 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 102: 6.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak260 µg/m³

Days over the guideline17 days

PM10265 µg/m³

Optical depth1.36

WHO 15

151617181920212223242526272829301234

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 · 131Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Luciara fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 12 September 2026 to 1 October 2026 (20 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 September 2026 to 26 September 2026.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,986 hectares (39.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Santa Terezinha (2,523 ha, 0.4 %); Luciara (1,490 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 40.3 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 57, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

INPE · Programa Queimadas ↗
IBAMA · Prevfogo ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

25 October 2026 Start date: 17 September 2026 → 12 September 2026.

RSS Changes to this page

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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.

How we know this

Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 September 2026 to 26 September 2026. 131 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
We have not matched this page with any official record.
Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.

Where it burned