Skip to content
worldfires
VE · Venezuela · →

Muñoz fire, 9 February 2019 Muñoz

Out · last detection 14 Feb 2019, 17:20 UTC

The fire started on 9 February 2019 in Muñoz, Venezuela, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,009 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 531th largest in Apure since 2016 (of 919 with a page). Number 159 in Venezuela in 2019, of 296.

Burnt area
2,009ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
9 Feb 2019 – 14 Feb 2019
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
9 Feb
2019
Heat detections
49
in a single hotspot: 94 MW
Danger at start
38
High · FWI index
Energy released
517MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Feb 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Feb14 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

910111214

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
42km/h · peak gust
27%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Muñoz 27,542 inhabitants where it started
    2,023 ha reached on 9 Feb
    0.3 %

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)
9 Feb 35.7 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
10 Feb 35.3 °C 28 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
11 Feb 35.9 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
12 Feb 36.0 °C 27 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
13 Feb 37.2 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Feb 36.5 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Feb after 37.1 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 Feb after 38.1 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
17 Feb after 36.8 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
18 Feb after 35.6 °C 33 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Feb after 33.7 °C 36 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
20 Feb after 35.6 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
21 Feb after 35.4 °C 29 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
22 Feb after 35.4 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
23 Feb after 34.8 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
24 Feb after 35.0 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Feb 2019
After · 21 Feb 2019

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 · 49Every 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 Venezuela ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Muñoz fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 February 2019 and 14 February 2019: 6 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 2,009 hectares (20.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Muñoz (2,023 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 42 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 Venezuela (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: 911

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 911.

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.