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Parnarama fire, August 2017 Parnarama

Out · last detection 30 Aug 2017, 17:09 UTC

The fire started on 21 August 2017 in Parnarama, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,804 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 382th largest in Maranhão since 2016 (of 607 with a page). Number 700 in Brazil in 2017, of 994.

Burnt area
3,804ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
21 Aug 2017 – 29 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
21 Aug
2017
Heat detections
163
in a single hotspot: 178 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.5GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

30 Aug 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Aug29 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

212223252627282930

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
51km/h · peak gust
28%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

34% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,291 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Parnarama 31,250 inhabitants where it started
    3,829 ha reached on 17 Aug
    1.2 %

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 33.8 °C 38 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
18 Aug 34.3 °C 37 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
19 Aug 35.2 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
20 Aug 33.2 °C 45 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
21 Aug 34.8 °C 39 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
22 Aug 34.3 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Aug 33.5 °C 36 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
24 Aug 32.7 °C 43 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 Aug 33.7 °C 40 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
26 Aug 34.0 °C 36 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
27 Aug 34.1 °C 33 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
28 Aug 34.6 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
29 Aug 34.9 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
30 Aug after 35.1 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
31 Aug after 36.3 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
1 Sept after 35.2 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
2 Sept after 34.2 °C 35 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
3 Sept after 34.0 °C 28 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Sept after 33.8 °C 32 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Sept after 33.4 °C 37 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
6 Sept after 34.9 °C 38 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
7 Sept after 34.0 °C 38 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Sept after 35.5 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Sept after 34.7 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
10 Sept after 34.8 °C 34 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
11 Sept after 35.1 °C 34 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
12 Sept after 35.1 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
13 Sept after 34.4 °C 34 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Aug 2017
After · 5 Sept 2017

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 · 163Every 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 Parnarama fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 August 2017 and 29 August 2017: 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 3,804 hectares (38.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Parnarama (3,829 ha, 1.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 28 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 44, 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.

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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.