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Ouro Preto do Oeste fire, August 2018 Ouro Preto do Oeste, Vale do Paraíso, Ji-Paraná

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2018, 16:50 UTC

The fire started on 19 August 2018 in Ouro Preto do Oeste, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 32 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 13,673 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 27th largest in Rondônia since 2016 (of 300 with a page). Number 15 in Brazil in 2018, of 291.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Vale do Paraíso · 2017Ouro Preto do Oeste · 2016Ouro Preto do Oeste · 2017Ouro Preto do Oeste · 2020

Burnt area
13,673ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
32days
19 Aug 2018 – 19 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
19 Aug
2018
Heat detections
1,312
in a single hotspot: 292 MW
Danger at start
9
Low · FWI index
Average daily power
445MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 19 Aug19 Sept
19 Sept 2018

How it evolved, day by day

19 Aug 2018 · 2 MW · 2 20 Aug 2018 · 99 MW · 30 21 Aug 2018 · 82 MW · 27 22 Aug 2018 · 2,376 MW · 114 23 Aug 2018 · 1,952 MW · 181 24 Aug 2018 · 376 MW · 85 25 Aug 2018 · 248 MW · 91 26 Aug 2018 · 50 MW · 11 27 Aug 2018 · 1,001 MW · 108 28 Aug 2018 · 236 MW · 35 29 Aug 2018 · 106 MW · 15 30 Aug 2018 · 284 MW · 32 31 Aug 2018 · 792 MW · 70 1 Sept 2018 · 1,390 MW · 46 3 Sept 2018 · 125 MW · 12 4 Sept 2018 · 529 MW · 54 5 Sept 2018 · 721 MW · 115 6 Sept 2018 · 272 MW · 48 7 Sept 2018 · 155 MW · 17 8 Sept 2018 · 106 MW · 17 9 Sept 2018 · 1,278 MW · 52 10 Sept 2018 · 299 MW · 76 11 Sept 2018 · 184 MW · 41 12 Sept 2018 · 175 MW · 23 14 Sept 2018 · 4 MW · 1 15 Sept 2018 · 37 MW · 5 16 Sept 2018 · 10 MW · 2 17 Sept 2018 · 14 MW · 1 19 Sept 2018 · 10 MW · 1
19 Aug 22 Aug 24 Aug 29 Aug 4 Sept 9 Sept 15 Sept

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
44km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.5 mm on 20 Sept.

This area had burned before

86% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 6,584 ha in 2016, 15,607 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,802 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 8.6% of the area of London (137 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Ouro Preto do Oeste where it started
    11,145 ha reached on 19 Aug
    5.6 %
  2. Vale do Paraíso 6,479 inhabitants
    2,601 ha reached on 19 Aug
    2.7 %
  3. Ji-Paraná 124,333 inhabitants
    1 ha
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020
Built-up area0.60 ha
Residents≈ 40

Inside the perimeter there were about 0.60 hectares of built-up land and about 40 residents (GHSL 2020, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
19 Aug 33.9 °C 40 % 25 km/h 1.7 mm Low 9
20 Aug 26.7 °C 67 % 35 km/h 3.6 mm Very low 2
21 Aug 29.2 °C 48 % 28 km/h 0.4 mm Low 7
22 Aug 33.0 °C 43 % 30 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 14
23 Aug 32.9 °C 43 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
24 Aug 33.2 °C 44 % 29 km/h 2.1 mm Low 6
25 Aug 28.3 °C 63 % 38 km/h 3.9 mm Very low 2
26 Aug 28.0 °C 48 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
27 Aug 33.0 °C 37 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
28 Aug 34.7 °C 36 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
29 Aug 33.7 °C 45 % 31 km/h 0.8 mm Moderate 12
30 Aug 34.1 °C 41 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
31 Aug 35.6 °C 38 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
1 Sept 36.1 °C 36 % 26 km/h 3.4 mm Low 6
2 Sept 33.5 °C 37 % 34 km/h 1.2 mm Moderate 13
3 Sept 32.0 °C 38 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
4 Sept 31.4 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
5 Sept 33.7 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
6 Sept 34.8 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
7 Sept 36.0 °C 25 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
8 Sept 36.5 °C 27 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
9 Sept 37.0 °C 27 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
10 Sept 34.6 °C 39 % 21 km/h 0.2 mm High 25
11 Sept 36.2 °C 34 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
12 Sept 37.0 °C 32 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
13 Sept 35.1 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.7 mm High 22
14 Sept 32.1 °C 58 % 27 km/h 6.3 mm Very low 3
15 Sept 33.2 °C 47 % 26 km/h 3.2 mm Very low 4
16 Sept 28.3 °C 69 % 33 km/h 7.8 mm Very low 0
17 Sept 34.5 °C 48 % 25 km/h 1.9 mm Very low 2
18 Sept 32.7 °C 50 % 25 km/h 10.7 mm Very low 1
19 Sept 32.9 °C 56 % 30 km/h 2.4 mm Very low 1
20 Sept after 32.6 °C 67 % 26 km/h 7.5 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 12 Aug 2018
After · 26 Sept 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 · 1,312Every 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 Ouro Preto do Oeste fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 19 August 2018 to 19 September 2018 (32 days). The perimeter dates it from 20 August 2018 to 12 September 2018.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 13,673 hectares (136.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Ouro Preto do Oeste (11,145 ha, 5.6 %); Vale do Paraíso (2,601 ha, 2.7 %); Ji-Paraná (1 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.0 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 44 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 2 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 12 September 2018 → 19 September 2018.
  2. Start date: 20 August 2018 → 19 August 2018.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 20 August 2018 to 12 September 2018. 1,312 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.