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Miranda fire, September 2021 Miranda, Bodoquena

Out · last detection 1 Oct 2021, 17:13 UTC

The fire started on 18 September 2021 in Miranda, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 14 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 22,379 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 52th largest in Mato Grosso do Sul since 2016 (of 506 with a page). Number 46 in Brazil in 2021, of 814.

Burnt area
22,379ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
14days
18 Sept 2021 – 1 Oct 2021
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
18 Sept
2021
Heat detections
894
in a single hotspot: 179 MW
Danger at start
25
High · FWI index
Energy released
6.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Oct 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 18 Sept1 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

1920212223242526272829301

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
68km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.9 mm on 3 Oct.

This area had burned before

69% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 57 ha in 2016, 1,723 ha in 2017, 11 ha in 2018, 15,435 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 15,456 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Miranda 25,536 inhabitants where it started
    21,900 ha reached on 19 Sept
    4.0 %
  2. Bodoquena 8,567 inhabitants
    604 ha reached on 20 Sept
    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)
14 Sept 36.0 °C 34 % 68 km/h 0.7 mm High 25
15 Sept 30.6 °C 48 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
16 Sept 32.7 °C 45 % 25 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 18
17 Sept 35.7 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 21
18 Sept 37.5 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
19 Sept 38.7 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
20 Sept 39.6 °C 16 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
21 Sept 30.8 °C 27 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
22 Sept 31.4 °C 43 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
23 Sept 33.6 °C 35 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
24 Sept 32.8 °C 35 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
25 Sept 35.4 °C 27 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
26 Sept 34.9 °C 30 % 47 km/h 0.5 mm High 38
27 Sept 33.8 °C 35 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
28 Sept 35.6 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
29 Sept 36.0 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Sept 35.7 °C 32 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
1 Oct 36.7 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
2 Oct after 33.0 °C 44 % 43 km/h 0.8 mm High 24
3 Oct after 36.9 °C 30 % 66 km/h 1.9 mm High 33

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Sept 2021
After · 8 Oct 2021

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 · 894Every 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 Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Miranda fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 18 September 2021 and 1 October 2021: 14 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 22,379 hectares (223.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Miranda (21,900 ha, 4.0 %); Bodoquena (604 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.6 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very 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.

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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.

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.