Burned area
satellite only21,529ha
Perimeter published by NBAC (NRCan).
- Source
- NBAC (NRCan)
- Date
- 10 May 2020 – 26 May 2020
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
CA · Canada · –
Mountain (South) fire, 10 May 2020 Mountain (South), Pine Creek 66A, Division No. 19, Unorganized
Out · last detection 26 May 2020, 19:58 UTC
The fire started on 10 May 2020 in Mountain (South), Canada, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Canada’s CWFIS (Natural Resources Canada) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 21,529 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 census subdivisions.
It is the 20th largest in Manitoba since 2016 (of 223 with a page). Number 3 in Canada in 2020, of 31.
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only17days
10 May 2020 to 26 May 2020: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- NBAC (NRCan) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 26 May 2020, 19:58 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only10 May 2020
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- NBAC (NRCan) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 10 May 2020
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only448
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 373 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 10 May 2020 – 26 May 2020
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only4,740MW
Total radiative power on 17 May 2020; hotspots that day: 127.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 17 May 2020
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model3.8FWI · very low
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 7.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 10 May 2020, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model21.6°C · 36% RH
High of 21.6 °C and minimum humidity of 36% on 19 May 2020; gusts of 53 km/h on 18 May 2020.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 10 May 2020 – 26 May 2020
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
Living inside
model≈ 450people
Estimated residents inside the perimeter and 4.2 ha of built-up area (100 m grid, epoch 2020).
- Source
- GHSL R2023A · JRC
- Date
- calculated on 24 October 2026
+− cross-check
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.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 21,529 ha
- Dates
- 10 May 2020 – 26 May 2020
- Name
- Mountain (South)
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/mountain-south-2020-05?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire mountain-south-2020-05.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-05-10 | 4 | 17 | 1.7 | -2.4 | 47 | 22.1 | 43.9 | 0 | 3.8 | muy_bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-11 | 4 | 18 | 3.5 | -5 | 30 | 14.8 | 31.7 | 0 | 3.6 | muy_bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-12 | 5 | 75 | 9.2 | -4.8 | 20 | 18.2 | 31.7 | 0 | 6.5 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-13 | 0 | 0 | 5.7 | 0.6 | 60 | 16.6 | 29.5 | 0 | 4.2 | muy_bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-14 | 1 | 3 | 11.3 | 0.1 | 47 | 31.5 | 47.9 | 0 | 7.8 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-15 | 0 | 0 | 6.6 | 0.6 | 43 | 27.6 | 51.8 | 0 | 7.1 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-16 | 0 | 0 | 13.5 | 0 | 45 | 21.5 | 36.7 | 0 | 6.3 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-17 | 127 | 4,740 | 19.3 | 7.3 | 22 | 24.5 | 46.8 | 0 | 12.8 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-18 | 0 | 0 | 18.8 | 11.9 | 32 | 27.8 | 52.9 | 0.1 | 15.1 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-19 | 191 | 4,128 | 21.6 | 11.9 | 36 | 25.6 | 50.4 | 0.1 | 15.2 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-20 | 98 | 625 | 15.3 | 7.8 | 63 | 21.5 | 38.9 | 0.2 | 8.6 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-21 | 0 | 0 | 18.3 | 8.7 | 65 | 25.5 | 42.5 | 0.1 | 8.9 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-22 | 13 | 318 | 20.4 | 11.2 | 33 | 23.1 | 37.1 | 0 | 12.8 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-23 | 1 | 103 | 21 | 10.7 | 33 | 16.7 | 37.4 | 1 | 8.7 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-24 | 0 | 0 | 14.7 | 9.1 | 53 | 19.5 | 32.4 | 0 | 9.8 | bajo | 1 |
| 2020-05-25 | 2 | 5 | 18.9 | 7.8 | 31 | 17.2 | 32 | 0 | 12.4 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-26 | 2 | 3 | 21.6 | 10.3 | 33 | 19.2 | 35.6 | 0.3 | 14.8 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-05-27 | 0 | 0 | 18.4 | 13 | 33 | 30.6 | 60.5 | 0.2 | 21 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-05-28 | 0 | 0 | 11.4 | 7.3 | 68 | 31.2 | 58.3 | 2.2 | 4.7 | muy_bajo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: NBAC (NRCan), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 21,529ha
- official perimeter (CWFIS)
- Duration
- 17days
- 10 May 2020 – 26 May 2020
- Census subdivisions hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 10 May
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 448
- in a single hotspot: 373 MW
- Danger at start
- 4
- Very low · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 912MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
10 May26 May
26 May 2020
How it evolved, day by day
10 May
17 May
25 May
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
22°high
53km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity
It had gone 7 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 28 May.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
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 census subdivision
-
Mountain (South) where it started12,776 ha reached on 10 May7.9 %
-
5,340 ha reached on 14 May64 %
-
3,398 ha reached on 12 May0.0 %
Burnt area inside each census subdivision, from crossing the official 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 2020Built-up area4.2 ha
Residents≈ 450
Inside the perimeter there were about 4.2 hectares of built-up land and about 450 residents (GHSL 2020, 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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 May | 1.7 °C | 47 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 4 |
| 11 May | 3.5 °C | 30 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 4 |
| 12 May | 9.2 °C | 20 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 6 |
| 13 May | 5.7 °C | 60 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very low 4 |
| 14 May | 11.3 °C | 47 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 8 |
| 15 May | 6.6 °C | 43 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 7 |
| 16 May | 13.5 °C | 45 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 6 |
| 17 May | 19.3 °C | 22 % | 47 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 18 May | 18.8 °C | 32 % | 53 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 19 May | 21.6 °C | 36 % | 50 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 20 May | 15.3 °C | 63 % | 39 km/h | 0.2 mm | Low 9 |
| 21 May | 18.3 °C | 65 % | 42 km/h | 0.1 mm | Low 9 |
| 22 May | 20.4 °C | 33 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 23 May | 21.0 °C | 33 % | 37 km/h | 1.0 mm | Low 9 |
| 24 May | 14.7 °C | 53 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 10 |
| 25 May | 18.9 °C | 31 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 26 May | 21.6 °C | 33 % | 36 km/h | 0.3 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 27 May after | 18.4 °C | 33 % | 60 km/h | 0.2 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 28 May after | 11.4 °C | 68 % | 58 km/h | 2.2 mm | Very low 5 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 3.8, a minimum humidity of 47% and 7 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2017: 16.
FWI at the start
3.8
Minimum humidity
47 %
Days without rain
7
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Mountain (South) fire, 10 May 2020
21,529 ha
17 days
FWI 3.8
Min. humidity 47 %
Fairford (Part) 50 fire, April 2019
1,106 ha
32 days
FWI 2.4
Min. humidity 48 %
117 km away, in 2019
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.8 mm on 24 May.
Division No. 19, Unorganized fire, May 2018
1,137 ha
21 days
FWI 0.6
Min. humidity 47 %
72 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.8 mm on 24 May.
Division No. 19, Unorganized fire, May 2021
21,204 ha
12 days
FWI 2.0
Min. humidity 51 %
38 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 8.3 mm on 21 May.
Division No. 19, Unorganized fire, April 2018
9,115 ha
59 days
FWI 1.0
Min. humidity 49 %
91 km away, in 2018
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.6 mm on 22 Jun.
Division No. 19, Unorganized fire, July 2021
2,299 ha
28 days
FWI 3.6
Min. humidity 39 %
27 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 28.0 mm on 4 Aug.
What happened to them
- 12 days
- median duration
- 1,548 ha
- median area
- 100 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 8.0 mm
- rain at the end (median; 16 of 16 had it)
It was 13.9 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 17 days, against 12 days.
Only 1 of its 16 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. All of them had rain in the ten days after the end: the first rainy day brought a median of 8.0 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
2.2 mmfirst rain
28 May2 days after it ended
53km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 26 May, and on 28 May 2.2 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 16 of 16, with a median of 8.0 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 2017.
- 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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 3 May 2020
After · 2 Jun 2020
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 · 448Every 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
- 1,229 haMountain (South)31 May 2020 · 3 days · 19 km away
- 7,139 haMountain (South)18 May 2021 · 3 days · 22 km away
- 1,215 haMountain (South)17 May 2020 · 3 days · 23 km away
- 10,084 haMountain (South)11 May 2021 · 61 days · 27 km away
- 2,299 haDivision No. 19, Unorganized4 July 2021 · 28 days · 27 km away
- 4,324 haDivision No. 19, Unorganized13 May 2021 · 7 days · 29 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Mountain (South) fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 10 May 2020 to 26 May 2020 (17 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 May 2020 to 25 May 2020.
- How much area did it burn?
- The official perimeter mapped by Canada’s CWFIS (Natural Resources Canada) is 21,529 hectares (215.3 km²). Other tallies, such as those of provincial agencies, may give slightly different figures.
- Which census subdivisions burned?
- The fire entered 3 census subdivisions: Mountain (South) (12,776 ha, 7.9 %); Pine Creek 66A (5,340 ha, 64 %); Division No. 19, Unorganized (3,398 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 21.6 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 15, class Moderate.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the official burnt perimeter of Canada’s CWFIS (NBAC, Natural Resources Canada) or, for the current season and until NBAC publishes it, the one rebuilt by GWIS (Copernicus); from NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots; and from the administrative boundaries of Canada. 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 2017 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 16. Their median duration was 12 days and their median area 1,548 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 1 of its 16 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. All of them had rain in the ten days after the end: the first rainy day brought a median of 8.0 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: 911 · Emergency number and official warnings
- CIFFC · Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre ↗
- CWFIS · Canadian Wildland Fire Information System ↗
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.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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: NBAC (Natural Resources Canada), official.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 May 2020 to 25 May 2020. 448 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 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
Where this data comes from
The perimeter is official: it comes from the National Burned Area Composite (NBAC) of the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System (CWFIS), Natural Resources Canada, which maps it on satellite imagery and publishes it under the Open Government Licence – Canada. Until NBAC publishes the current season, this year’s fires carry the perimeter rebuilt from heat detections by GWIS (Copernicus, CC BY 4.0), which is approximate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Census subdivision boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM3 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). The area per census subdivision is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.