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Pilcomayo fire, 23 December 2021 Pilcomayo

Out · last detection 29 Dec 2021, 17:43 UTC

The fire started on 23 December 2021 in Pilcomayo, Argentina, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,304 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 281th largest in Formosa since 2016 (of 620 with a page). Number 100 in Argentina in 2021, of 217.

Burnt area
2,304ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
7days
23 Dec 2021 – 29 Dec 2021
Municipalities hit
1
departments
Started on
23 Dec
2021
Heat detections
84
in a single hotspot: 97 MW
Danger at start
20
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
1.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Dec 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Dec29 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

232425262729

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
41km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.9 mm on 3 Jan.

This area had burned before

49% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 334 ha in 2018, 1,030 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,135 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Pilcomayo where it started
    2,315 ha reached on 23 Dec
    0.4 %

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)
23 Dec 33.3 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
24 Dec 34.3 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
25 Dec 36.7 °C 31 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
26 Dec 37.7 °C 27 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
27 Dec 36.7 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
28 Dec 37.3 °C 24 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
29 Dec 38.4 °C 22 % 20 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
30 Dec after 39.7 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
31 Dec after 38.2 °C 29 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
1 Jan after 39.8 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Jan after 35.5 °C 43 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm High 23
3 Jan after 30.8 °C 67 % 32 km/h 5.9 mm Very low 2

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Dec 2021
After · 5 Jan 2022

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 · 84Every 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 Argentina ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pilcomayo fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 23 December 2021 and 29 December 2021: 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 2,304 hectares (23.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Pilcomayo (2,315 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.4 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 27, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Argentina (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: 911 · 100

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
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 911 · 100.

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.