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Óbidos fire, October 2024 Óbidos

Out · last detection 31 Oct 2024, 17:05 UTC

The fire started on 22 October 2024 in Óbidos, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,215 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 996th largest in Pará since 2016 (of 1095 with a page). Number 1189 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

The power measured by the satellite is low (19.1 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
3,215ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
22 Oct 2024 – 31 Oct 2024
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
22 Oct
2024
Heat detections
78
in a single hotspot: 19 MW
Danger at start
36
High · FWI index
Energy released
387MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

31 Oct 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 22 Oct31 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

222324252628293031

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
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.7 mm on 11 Nov.

This area had burned before

50% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 98 ha in 2016, 1,300 ha in 2017, 262 ha in 2020, 63 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,596 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Óbidos 52,229 inhabitants where it started
    3,238 ha reached on 22 Oct
    0.1 %

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)
22 Oct 34.9 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Oct 36.2 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
24 Oct 36.6 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
25 Oct 36.9 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.1 mm High 38
26 Oct 35.9 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
27 Oct 35.8 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
28 Oct 35.5 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
29 Oct 35.9 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
30 Oct 36.2 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.1 mm High 38
31 Oct 35.5 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 38
1 Nov after 36.1 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
2 Nov after 36.1 °C 27 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Nov after 36.2 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 40
4 Nov after 36.0 °C 35 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 37
5 Nov after 36.2 °C 34 % 25 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
6 Nov after 35.2 °C 41 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Nov after 35.8 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
8 Nov after 35.3 °C 37 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
9 Nov after 35.7 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
10 Nov after 35.8 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Nov after 33.3 °C 48 % 29 km/h 3.7 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 15 Oct 2024
After · 7 Nov 2024

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 31 October 2024 the air beside the fire reached 23 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 17: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak23 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1035 µg/m³
Optical depth0.74
202122232425262728293031123
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 · 78Every 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 22 October 2024 and 31 October 2024: 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 3,215 hectares (32.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Óbidos (3,238 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 41 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 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.