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Oeiras fire, October 2018 Oeiras, São Francisco do Piauí

Out · last detection 13 Oct 2018, 16:00 UTC

The fire started on 3 October 2018 in Oeiras, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,731 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 559th largest in Piaui since 2016 (of 804 with a page). Number 188 in Brazil in 2018, of 291.

Burnt area
3,731ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
3 Oct 2018 – 13 Oct 2018
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
3 Oct
2018
Heat detections
198
in a single hotspot: 104 MW
Danger at start
47
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.7GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

13 Oct 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Oct13 Oct

How it evolved, day by day

34578910111213

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
48km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.6 mm on 15 Oct.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Oeiras 38,161 inhabitants where it started
    2,028 ha reached on 3 Oct
    0.8 %
  2. São Francisco do Piauí 5,392 inhabitants
    1,728 ha reached on 4 Oct
    1.3 %

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)
3 Oct 38.5 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
4 Oct 39.1 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
5 Oct 38.4 °C 31 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
6 Oct 37.0 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
7 Oct 38.0 °C 29 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
8 Oct 37.7 °C 26 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
9 Oct 38.8 °C 18 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
10 Oct 39.0 °C 21 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
11 Oct 38.4 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
12 Oct 37.6 °C 28 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
13 Oct 38.3 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
14 Oct after 40.0 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
15 Oct after 36.2 °C 41 % 29 km/h 1.6 mm High 23

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Sept 2018
After · 20 Oct 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 · 198Every 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 Oeiras fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 October 2018 and 13 October 2018: 11 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 3,731 hectares (37.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Oeiras (2,028 ha, 0.8 %); São Francisco do Piauí (1,728 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.1 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 48 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
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.