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Óbidos fire, 28 October 2018 Óbidos

Out · last detection 5 Nov 2018, 17:12 UTC

The fire started on 28 October 2018 in Óbidos, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,711 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 559th largest in Pará since 2016 (of 1095 with a page). Number 111 in Brazil in 2018, of 291.

The power measured by the satellite is low (16.2 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
4,711ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
28 Oct 2018 – 5 Nov 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
28 Oct
2018
Heat detections
111
in a single hotspot: 16 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
418MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

5 Nov 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Oct5 Nov

How it evolved, day by day

2829303112345

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
36km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.2 mm on 6 Nov.

This area had burned before

68% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 3,183 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Óbidos 52,229 inhabitants where it started
    4,745 ha reached on 28 Oct
    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)
28 Oct 35.1 °C 40 % 33 km/h 0.6 mm High 22
29 Oct 34.6 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
30 Oct 33.7 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 25
31 Oct 35.8 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.2 mm High 29
1 Nov 34.3 °C 37 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
2 Nov 35.1 °C 39 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Nov 33.6 °C 43 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm High 24
4 Nov 32.9 °C 45 % 27 km/h 1.0 mm Moderate 16
5 Nov 33.2 °C 47 % 28 km/h 2.2 mm Low 9
6 Nov after 35.3 °C 41 % 27 km/h 7.2 mm Very low 4

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Oct 2018
After · 12 Nov 2018

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 · 111Every 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 Óbidos fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 October 2018 and 5 November 2018: 9 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 4,711 hectares (47.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Óbidos (4,745 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.8 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class High.
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.

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

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 193.

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.