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VE · Venezuela · →

Muñoz fire, 20 January 2020 Muñoz

Out · last detection 25 Jan 2020, 17:51 UTC

The fire started on 20 January 2020 in Muñoz, Venezuela, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,819 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 630th largest in Apure since 2016 (of 919 with a page). Number 268 in Venezuela in 2020, of 402.

Burnt area
1,819ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
20 Jan 2020 – 25 Jan 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
20 Jan
2020
Heat detections
48
in a single hotspot: 53 MW
Danger at start
23
High · FWI index
Energy released
732MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Jan 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Jan25 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

202122232425

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
41km/h · peak gust
25%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days 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
    1,831 ha reached on 20 Jan
    0.2 %

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)
20 Jan 35.5 °C 43 % 32 km/h 0.2 mm High 23
21 Jan 36.9 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
22 Jan 36.6 °C 29 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Jan 37.1 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
24 Jan 36.8 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Jan 37.2 °C 25 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
26 Jan after 36.1 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
27 Jan after 38.4 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
28 Jan after 37.7 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 Jan after 37.0 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Jan after 35.7 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
31 Jan after 36.1 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
1 Feb after 35.7 °C 34 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Feb after 36.9 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Feb after 37.2 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Feb after 36.4 °C 21 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Jan 2020
After · 1 Feb 2020

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 · 48Every 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 20 January 2020 and 25 January 2020: 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 1,819 hectares (18.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Muñoz (1,831 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.2 °C, humidity dropped to 25 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, class 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.