Magdalena fire, 8 October 2025 Magdalena, Baures
The fire started on 8 October 2025 in Magdalena, Bolivia, and satellites saw it burning for 19 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 21,879 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 45th largest in Beni since 2016 (of 903 with a page). Number 2 in Bolivia in 2025, of 94.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 21,879ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 19days
- 8 Oct 2025 – 26 Oct 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 8 Oct
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 694
- in a single hotspot: 267 MW
- Danger at start
- 18
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 780MW
- detected power per day, on average
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 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 2 Nov.
This area had burned before
98% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 886 ha in 2016, 1,352 ha in 2018, 2,379 ha in 2020, 15,435 ha in 2021, 7,029 ha in 2022, 7,071 ha in 2023, 16,144 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 21,507 ha that had burned before.
- 14,659 ha Baures fire, August 2024 134,466 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 9,063 ha Magdalena fire, September 2021 25,480 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 6,366 ha Baures fire, October 2023 30,869 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 4,166 ha Magdalena fire, September 2021 23,784 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,180 ha Magdalena fire, August 2022 4,746 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,299 ha Baures fire, October 2021 7,023 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 224 ha Magdalena fire, August 2022 16,384 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 170 ha Magdalena fire, September 2022 35,295 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
14,761 ha reached on 8 Oct1.0 %
-
Baures 7,488 inhabitants7,273 ha reached on 12 Oct0.4 %
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 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 Oct | 33.1 °C | 31 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 9 Oct | 35.5 °C | 29 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 10 Oct | 36.7 °C | 28 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 11 Oct | 36.9 °C | 34 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 12 Oct | 35.1 °C | 36 % | 38 km/h | 0.6 mm | High 23 |
| 13 Oct | 36.6 °C | 36 % | 38 km/h | 7.2 mm | Low 7 |
| 14 Oct | 33.1 °C | 48 % | 29 km/h | 4.5 mm | Very low 3 |
| 15 Oct | 34.1 °C | 44 % | 35 km/h | 1.3 mm | Low 8 |
| 16 Oct | 35.4 °C | 39 % | 33 km/h | 0.4 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 17 Oct | 36.6 °C | 36 % | 30 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 18 Oct | 38.3 °C | 31 % | 47 km/h | 11.1 mm | Low 11 |
| 19 Oct | 30.4 °C | 46 % | 41 km/h | 3.2 mm | Very low 4 |
| 20 Oct | 31.2 °C | 44 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 8 |
| 21 Oct | 34.3 °C | 42 % | 34 km/h | 1.1 mm | Low 8 |
| 22 Oct | 34.6 °C | 42 % | 34 km/h | 1.6 mm | Low 9 |
| 23 Oct | 35.1 °C | 41 % | 29 km/h | 1.9 mm | Low 8 |
| 24 Oct | 36.6 °C | 34 % | 34 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 25 Oct | 36.9 °C | 36 % | 45 km/h | 1.5 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 26 Oct | 33.8 °C | 48 % | 40 km/h | 10.5 mm | Very low 2 |
| 27 Oct after | 29.7 °C | 64 % | 22 km/h | 24.1 mm | Very low 0 |
| 28 Oct after | 31.9 °C | 57 % | 26 km/h | 16.3 mm | Very low 0 |
| 29 Oct after | 27.3 °C | 61 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 2 |
| 30 Oct after | 29.4 °C | 55 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 4 |
| 31 Oct after | 30.7 °C | 55 % | 24 km/h | 0.7 mm | Very low 4 |
| 1 Nov after | 34.3 °C | 44 % | 36 km/h | 0.2 mm | Low 8 |
| 2 Nov after | 34.6 °C | 46 % | 29 km/h | 1.0 mm | Low 7 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 14 October 2025 the air beside the fire reached 141 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 78: 5.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 694Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 23,784 haMagdalena13 September 2021 · 22 days · 8 km away
- 30,869 haBaures24 October 2023 · 27 days · 9 km away
- 30,494 haMagdalena28 September 2020 · 26 days · 17 km away
- 25,480 haMagdalena18 September 2021 · 17 days · 18 km away
- 35,295 haMagdalena15 September 2022 · 23 days · 20 km away
- 134,466 haBaures10 August 2024 · 75 days · 24 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Magdalena fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 October 2025 and 26 October 2025: 19 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 21,879 hectares (218.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Magdalena (14,761 ha, 1.0 %); Baures (7,273 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 28 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 24, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bolivia (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: 119 · 110 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery; 2 polygons grouped in this page.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 694 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.
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 ADM3 (Public Domain). 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.