Paranatinga fire, 17 August 2026 Paranatinga
The fire started on 17 August 2026 in Paranatinga, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,135 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 1363th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 466 in Brazil in 2026, of 749.
- Burnt area
- 4,135ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 17 Aug 2026 – 23 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 17 Aug
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 156
- in a single hotspot: 146 MW
- Danger at start
- 51
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 3.1GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 40 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 2 Sept.
This area had burned before
97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,210 ha in 2017, 1,797 ha in 2019, 2,747 ha in 2020, 3,243 ha in 2023, 215 ha in 2025. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,996 ha that had burned before.
- 3,243 ha Paranatinga fire, August 2023 16,795 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 2,747 ha Paranatinga fire, September 2020 15,503 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,210 ha Paranatinga fire, August 2017 25,261 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 214 ha Paranatinga fire, August 2025 3,229 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1 ha Paranatinga fire, October 2025 6,553 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
4,161 ha reached on 17 Aug0.2 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 17 Aug | 36.2 °C | 18 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 18 Aug | 36.2 °C | 20 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 19 Aug | 36.7 °C | 18 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 20 Aug | 36.7 °C | 19 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 21 Aug | 36.7 °C | 22 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 22 Aug | 37.4 °C | 20 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 23 Aug | 37.8 °C | 19 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 24 Aug after | 37.5 °C | 18 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 25 Aug after | 37.5 °C | 20 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 26 Aug after | 37.8 °C | 22 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 27 Aug after | 37.2 °C | 24 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 28 Aug after | 36.3 °C | 27 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 29 Aug after | 37.0 °C | 25 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 30 Aug after | 37.6 °C | 22 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 31 Aug after | 39.2 °C | 20 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 1 Sept after | 37.5 °C | 29 % | 25 km/h | 0.9 mm | High 32 |
| 2 Sept after | 33.5 °C | 44 % | 22 km/h | 1.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 22 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 106 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 156Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 15,503 haParanatinga2 September 2020 · 21 days · 2 km away
- 16,795 haParanatinga4 August 2023 · 12 days · 5 km away
- 25,261 haParanatinga19 August 2017 · 39 days · 15 km away
- 20,508 haParanatinga29 August 2019 · 24 days · 17 km away
- 20,898 haParanatingaJune 2026 · 17 days · 19 km away
- 20,889 haParanatinga3 September 2019 · 20 days · 30 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Paranatinga fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 August 2026 and 23 August 2026: 7 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 4,135 hectares (41.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Paranatinga (4,161 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 37.8 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 51, 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
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.