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Mulchén fire, 3 February 2023 Mulchén, Collipulli

Out · last detection 12 Feb 2023, 05:33 UTC

The fire started on 3 February 2023 in Mulchén, Chile, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 11,526 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 8th largest in Región del Bío-Bío since 2016 (of 74 with a page). Number 8 in Chile in 2023, of 70.

Burnt area
11,526ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
3 Feb 2023 – 12 Feb 2023
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
3 Feb
2023
Heat detections
1,016
in a single hotspot: 213 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
18.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

12 Feb 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Feb12 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

3456789101112

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
54km/h · peak gust
16%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

11% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 218 ha in 2020, 536 ha in 2021, 617 ha in 2022.

What happened to each town

  1. Mulchén where it started
    7,518 ha reached on 3 Feb
    3.9 %
  2. Collipulli
    4,032 ha reached on 4 Feb
    3.1 %

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)
3 Feb 39.3 °C 16 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
4 Feb 34.2 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
5 Feb 28.2 °C 40 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
6 Feb 29.0 °C 36 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
7 Feb 28.8 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
8 Feb 28.8 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
9 Feb 29.6 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
10 Feb 27.4 °C 40 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
11 Feb 27.2 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
12 Feb 23.7 °C 53 % 41 km/h 0.6 mm Moderate 18
13 Feb after 22.8 °C 40 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 19
14 Feb after 21.7 °C 49 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
15 Feb after 23.0 °C 49 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
16 Feb after 21.2 °C 36 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
17 Feb after 26.7 °C 14 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Feb after 28.0 °C 19 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
19 Feb after 26.2 °C 40 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
20 Feb after 26.4 °C 31 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
21 Feb after 27.4 °C 33 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
22 Feb after 27.8 °C 31 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 27

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Jan 2023
After · 19 Feb 2023

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 5 February 2023 the air beside the fire reached 788 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 430: 29 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak788 µg/m³
Days over the guideline8 days
PM101,129 µg/m³
Optical depth3.90
123456789101112131415
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 · 1,016Every 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 Chile ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Mulchén fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 February 2023 and 12 February 2023: 10 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 11,526 hectares (115.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mulchén (7,518 ha, 3.9 %); Collipulli (4,032 ha, 3.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.3 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Chile (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: 130 (CONAF) · 132

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.

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 130 (CONAF) · 132.

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 (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.