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BR · Brazil · –

Monte Alegre do Piauí fire, September 2024 Bom Jesus, Monte Alegre do Piauí, Gilbués

Out · last detection 20 Sept 2024, 16:31 UTC

The fire started on 14 September 2024 in Monte Alegre do Piauí, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,776 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 455th largest in Piaui since 2016 (of 665 with a page). Number 977 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

Burnt area
3,776ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
14 Sept 2024 – 20 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
14 Sept
2024
Heat detections
123
in a single hotspot: 67 MW
Danger at start
52
Extreme · FWI index
Average daily power
199MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 Sept20 Sept
20 Sept 2024

How it evolved, day by day

14 Sept 2024 · 13 MW · 3 15 Sept 2024 · 49 MW · 5 16 Sept 2024 · 136 MW · 10 17 Sept 2024 · 594 MW · 21 18 Sept 2024 · 290 MW · 45 19 Sept 2024 · 280 MW · 33 20 Sept 2024 · 32 MW · 6
14 Sept 17 Sept 20 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

38°high
46km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

72% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 397 ha in 2016, 415 ha in 2018, 1,698 ha in 2020, 911 ha in 2022, 1,083 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,709 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 2.4% of the area of London (38 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

  1. Bom Jesus 28,796 inhabitants
    2,056 ha reached on 17 Sept
    0.4 %
  2. Monte Alegre do Piauí 10,660 inhabitants where it started
    1,732 ha reached on 14 Sept
    0.7 %
  3. Gilbués 10,892 inhabitants
    12 ha
    0.0 %

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 area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside 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)

Started with 60 days without rain: 55 % of the area in Brazil

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
14 Sept 34.6 °C 19 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
15 Sept 35.9 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
16 Sept 36.4 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
17 Sept 37.7 °C 16 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
18 Sept 36.9 °C 16 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
19 Sept 35.7 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
20 Sept 36.7 °C 17 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
21 Sept after 37.3 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
22 Sept after 37.3 °C 18 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
23 Sept after 37.1 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
24 Sept after 36.7 °C 20 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
25 Sept after 34.0 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
26 Sept after 35.4 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Sept after 36.5 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
28 Sept after 38.7 °C 17 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
29 Sept after 36.0 °C 25 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
30 Sept after 34.9 °C 28 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 51.7, a minimum humidity of 19% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 18.

FWI at the start 51.7
Minimum humidity 19 %
Days without rain 60+
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Monte Alegre do Piauí fire, October 2020
4,511 ha 11 days FWI 51.9 Min. humidity 20 % 41 km away, in 2020

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.0 mm on 25 Oct.

What happened to them

9 days
median duration
3,785 ha
median area
0 %
went past 10,000 ha
2.2 mm
rain at the end (median; 7 of 18 had it)

It burned an area similar to its twins (3,776 ha against a median of 3,785 ha) and lasted 7 days, against 9 days.

In 11 of 18, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 2.2 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
46km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 20 Sept, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 7 of 18, with a median of 2.2 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 Sept 2024
After · 27 Sept 2024

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 17 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 12 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak12 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1017 µg/m³
Optical depth0.34
12 Sept15 Sept18 Sept21 Sept
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 · 123Every 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 Monte Alegre do Piauí fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 September 2024 and 20 September 2024: 7 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 3,776 hectares (37.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Bom Jesus (2,056 ha, 0.4 %); Monte Alegre do Piauí (1,732 ha, 0.7 %); Gilbués (12 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.7 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, 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.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 18. Their median duration was 9 days and their median area 3,785 ha; 0 % went past 10,000 ha. In 11 of 18, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 2.2 mm.

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

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night 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
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 193.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 123 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.