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Madera fire, April 2022 Madera

Out · last detection 21 May 2022, 08:42 UTC

The fire started on 28 April 2022 in Madera, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 24 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,824 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 16th largest in Chihuahua since 2016 (of 235 with a page). Number 9 in Mexico in 2022, of 235.

Burnt area
11,824ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
24days
28 Apr 2022 – 21 May 2022
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
28 Apr
2022
Heat detections
930
in a single hotspot: 166 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
9.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

21 May 2022
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Apr21 May

How it evolved, day by day

282930123456789101112131415161718192021

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
65km/h · peak gust
5%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

64% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 7,625 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Madera where it started
    11,822 ha reached on 28 Apr
    1.4 %

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 28 April 2022 and burned 8,518 ha (the satellite measured 11,824 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)
28 Apr 23.5 °C 14 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 Apr 23.4 °C 12 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Apr 25.7 °C 10 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
1 May 24.1 °C 10 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
2 May 23.5 °C 11 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
3 May 24.8 °C 14 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
4 May 23.5 °C 16 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
5 May 25.4 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
6 May 27.4 °C 14 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
7 May 25.8 °C 18 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
8 May 25.7 °C 10 % 65 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
9 May 26.2 °C 12 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
10 May 26.4 °C 19 % 57 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 46
11 May 27.8 °C 14 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
12 May 27.4 °C 10 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
13 May 28.4 °C 8 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
14 May 30.0 °C 5 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
15 May 31.0 °C 7 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 May 29.3 °C 13 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
17 May 27.0 °C 10 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
18 May 26.8 °C 12 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 May 25.0 °C 17 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
20 May 23.8 °C 17 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
21 May 26.1 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
22 May after 25.1 °C 20 % 46 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 42
23 May after 24.8 °C 18 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
24 May after 23.9 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
25 May after 27.7 °C 15 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
26 May after 30.3 °C 14 % 48 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 46
27 May after 30.2 °C 13 % 44 km/h 0.8 mm Very high 41
28 May after 28.2 °C 10 % 61 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
29 May after 25.6 °C 12 % 69 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
30 May after 26.4 °C 21 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
31 May after 28.2 °C 15 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
1 Jun after 29.5 °C 15 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
2 Jun after 29.0 °C 18 % 52 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 47

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Apr 2022
After · 28 May 2022

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 · 930Every 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 Madera fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 April 2022 and 21 May 2022: 24 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 11,824 hectares (118.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Madera (11,822 ha, 1.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.0 °C, humidity dropped to 5 % and gusts hit 65 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, 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.