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Picos fire, September 2019 Picos, Dom Expedito Lopes, Ipiranga do Piauí

Out · last detection 25 Sept 2019, 15:54 UTC

The fire started on 17 September 2019 in Picos, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,514 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 222th largest in Piaui since 2016 (of 804 with a page). Number 322 in Brazil in 2019, of 974.

Burnt area
6,514ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
17 Sept 2019 – 25 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
17 Sept
2019
Heat detections
328
in a single hotspot: 84 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
3.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Sept 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Sept25 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

171819202122232425

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
50km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Picos 83,090 inhabitants where it started
    4,597 ha reached on 14 Sept
    7.9 %
  2. Dom Expedito Lopes 6,320 inhabitants
    1,797 ha reached on 21 Sept
    8.2 %
  3. Ipiranga do Piauí 9,420 inhabitants
    162 ha reached on 23 Sept
    0.3 %

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)
14 Sept 35.6 °C 27 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
15 Sept 35.7 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
16 Sept 35.0 °C 26 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
17 Sept 35.5 °C 24 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
18 Sept 35.3 °C 30 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Sept 36.2 °C 23 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Sept 36.8 °C 14 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
21 Sept 37.7 °C 18 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
22 Sept 36.4 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
23 Sept 36.6 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
24 Sept 35.0 °C 27 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
25 Sept 35.9 °C 20 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
26 Sept after 36.0 °C 25 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
27 Sept after 37.2 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
28 Sept after 38.1 °C 22 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
29 Sept after 35.1 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Sept after 35.7 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Oct after 36.3 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
2 Oct after 34.8 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
3 Oct after 36.1 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
4 Oct after 35.7 °C 27 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Oct after 35.5 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Sept 2019
After · 2 Oct 2019

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 · 328Every 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 Picos fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 17 September 2019 and 25 September 2019: 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 6,514 hectares (65.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Picos (4,597 ha, 7.9 %); Dom Expedito Lopes (1,797 ha, 8.2 %); Ipiranga do Piauí (162 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 37.7 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, 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.

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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.