How long did the Pedro Afonso fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 August 2024 and 31 August 2024: 8 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 3,212 hectares (32.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pedro Afonso (3,076 ha, 1.5 %); Tocantínia (157 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 62, 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.

BR · Brazil · 2024-08-24 → 2024-08-31

Pedro Afonso fire, August 2024 Pedro Afonso, Tocantínia

Out · last detection 31 Aug 2024, 16:06 UTC

The fire started on 24 August 2024 in Pedro Afonso, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,212 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 1123th largest in Tocantins since 2016 (of 1242 with a page). Number 1191 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

The power measured by the satellite is low (26.7 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: 3,212ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 8days; 24 Aug 2024 – 31 Aug 2024
Municipalities hit: 2; municipalities
Started on: 24 Aug; 2024
Heat detections: 90; in a single hotspot: 27 MW
Danger at start: 42; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 610MW; sum of detected power

Play back 31 Aug 2024

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Aug31 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

24252627282931

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

38°high

51km/h · peak gust

15%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

45% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 270 ha in 2016, 70 ha in 2019, 1,380 ha in 2020, 50 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,459 ha that had burned before.

70 ha Tocantínia fire, August 2019 5,117 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire

What happened to each town

Pedro Afonso 14,055 inhabitants where it started

3,076 ha reached on 24 Aug

1.5 %
Tocantínia 7,459 inhabitants

157 ha reached on 26 Aug

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	Danger (FWI)
24 Aug	35.7 °C	22 %	30 km/h	Very high 42
25 Aug	36.6 °C	22 %	22 km/h	High 38
26 Aug	37.4 °C	19 %	23 km/h	Very high 41
27 Aug	38.3 °C	18 %	29 km/h	Very high 45
28 Aug	36.9 °C	15 %	44 km/h	Extreme 57
29 Aug	35.1 °C	19 %	51 km/h	Extreme 62
30 Aug	35.1 °C	27 %	44 km/h	Extreme 51
31 Aug	35.7 °C	23 %	36 km/h	Very high 45
1 Sept after	36.6 °C	22 %	36 km/h	Very high 45
2 Sept after	37.3 °C	15 %	33 km/h	Very high 49
3 Sept after	36.7 °C	17 %	30 km/h	Very high 47
4 Sept after	39.2 °C	7 %	31 km/h	Extreme 56
5 Sept after	38.6 °C	10 %	31 km/h	Extreme 55
6 Sept after	38.1 °C	14 %	34 km/h	Extreme 57
7 Sept after	37.9 °C	16 %	30 km/h	Extreme 53
8 Sept after	38.0 °C	16 %	36 km/h	Extreme 58
9 Sept after	37.0 °C	20 %	40 km/h	Extreme 56
10 Sept after	36.6 °C	20 %	37 km/h	Extreme 54

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 17 Aug 2024

After · 7 Sept 2024

Before After

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 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 39 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 24: 1.6 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak39 µg/m³

Days over the guideline5 days

PM1056 µg/m³

Optical depth0.93

WHO 15

22232425262728293031123

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 · 90Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Brazil ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pedro Afonso fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 24 August 2024 and 31 August 2024: 8 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 3,212 hectares (32.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Pedro Afonso (3,076 ha, 1.5 %); Tocantínia (157 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 38.3 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 62, 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

INPE · Programa Queimadas ↗
IBAMA · Prevfogo ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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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What really happened?

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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.

Where it burned