How long did the Moa fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 August 2026 and 1 September 2026: 21 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 4,621 hectares (46.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Moa (3,020 ha, 4.0 %); Yateras (1,623 ha, 2.5 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 32.1 °C, humidity dropped to 47 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 16, class Moderate.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cuba (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

CU · Cuba · 2026-08-12 → 2026-09-01

Moa fire, August 2026 Moa, Yateras

Out · last detection 1 Sept 2026, 06:50 UTC

The fire started on 12 August 2026 in Moa, Cuba, and satellites saw it burning for 21 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,621 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 3th largest in Holguín since 2016 (of 30 with a page). Number 3 in Cuba in 2026, of 42.

Burnt area: 4,621ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 21days; 12 Aug 2026 – 1 Sept 2026
Municipalities hit: 2; municipalities
Started on: 12 Aug; 2026
Heat detections: 204; in a single hotspot: 200 MW
Danger at start: 10; Low · FWI index
Energy released: 1.4GW; sum of detected power

Play back 1 Sept 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Aug1 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

1415161718192021222627282930311

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

The weather it burned in

32°high

68km/h · peak gust

47%lowest humidity

It had gone 0 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 16.3 mm on 2 Sept.

This area had burned before

10% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 472 ha in 2021.

472 ha Yateras fire, April 2021 2,511 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Moa where it started

3,020 ha reached on 14 Aug

4.0 %
Yateras

1,623 ha reached on 14 Aug

2.5 %

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)
5 Aug	29.5 °C	60 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
6 Aug	29.7 °C	55 %	34 km/h	3.5 mm	Very low 2
7 Aug	29.0 °C	62 %	30 km/h	2.3 mm	Very low 2
8 Aug	28.9 °C	58 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 7
9 Aug	29.0 °C	58 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 10
10 Aug	29.1 °C	63 %	59 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
11 Aug	30.1 °C	50 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
12 Aug	29.6 °C	61 %	54 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
13 Aug	31.1 °C	51 %	34 km/h	1.6 mm	Low 7
14 Aug	31.0 °C	57 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
15 Aug	29.6 °C	59 %	66 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
16 Aug	29.0 °C	64 %	68 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 15
17 Aug	30.1 °C	59 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
18 Aug	31.7 °C	47 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
19 Aug	31.1 °C	50 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 14
20 Aug	30.6 °C	55 %	26 km/h	3.4 mm	Very low 3
21 Aug	30.4 °C	58 %	27 km/h	1.3 mm	Very low 4
22 Aug	30.0 °C	56 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
23 Aug	29.5 °C	59 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
24 Aug	30.2 °C	55 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
25 Aug	30.4 °C	57 %	33 km/h	1.1 mm	Low 9
26 Aug	31.0 °C	52 %	27 km/h	2.8 mm	Very low 4
27 Aug	30.6 °C	55 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
28 Aug	29.7 °C	57 %	39 km/h	0.1 mm	Moderate 13
29 Aug	29.7 °C	58 %	48 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
30 Aug	32.1 °C	51 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 16
31 Aug	31.0 °C	55 %	34 km/h	0.6 mm	Moderate 14
1 Sept	29.1 °C	63 %	29 km/h	11.9 mm	Very low 1
2 Sept after	27.4 °C	75 %	24 km/h	16.3 mm	Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 5 Aug 2026

After · 8 Sept 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 2 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 65 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 33: 2.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak65 µg/m³

Days over the guideline9 days

PM1066 µg/m³

Optical depth0.63

WHO 15

3456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930311234

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 · 204Every 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 Cuba ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Moa fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 August 2026 and 1 September 2026: 21 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 4,621 hectares (46.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Moa (3,020 ha, 4.0 %); Yateras (1,623 ha, 2.5 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 32.1 °C, humidity dropped to 47 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 16, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cuba (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: 105

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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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What really happened?

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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 105.

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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.

Where it burned