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Pinal Fire, May 2017 Gila

Out · last measured on 8 May 2017

The fire started on 8 May 2017 in Gila, United States, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) mapped an official burnt perimeter of 3,224 hectares, spread across a single county.

It is the 98th largest in Arizona since 2016 (of 380 with a page). Number 195 in United States in 2017, of 619.

Burnt area
3,224ha
official perimeter (MTBS / NIFC)
Duration
1day
8 May 2017 – 8 May 2017
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
8 May
2017
Heat detections
442
in a single hotspot: 219 MW
Danger at start
7
Low · FWI index

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 May8 May

The weather it burned in

30°high
78km/h · peak gust
6%lowest humidity

It had gone 45 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 31 May.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Gila where it started
    3,207 ha reached on 13 May
    0.3 %

Burnt area inside each county, from crossing the official 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)
8 May 17.6 °C 23 % 50 km/h 3.2 mm Low 7
9 May after 11.2 °C 36 % 40 km/h 6.1 mm Very low 1
10 May after 13.3 °C 33 % 42 km/h 1.2 mm Very low 4
11 May after 20.5 °C 30 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
12 May after 25.6 °C 17 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
13 May after 25.2 °C 12 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 May after 22.8 °C 14 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 May after 21.3 °C 13 % 78 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
16 May after 12.8 °C 28 % 53 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
17 May after 18.3 °C 18 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
18 May after 18.0 °C 14 % 57 km/h 0.5 mm High 35
19 May after 19.9 °C 10 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
20 May after 23.4 °C 10 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 May after 27.5 °C 7 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
22 May after 28.3 °C 8 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
23 May after 28.6 °C 8 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
24 May after 29.6 °C 7 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
25 May after 26.1 °C 6 % 64 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
26 May after 24.8 °C 8 % 62 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
27 May after 25.5 °C 7 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
28 May after 27.8 °C 6 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
29 May after 28.3 °C 7 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
30 May after 28.6 °C 11 % 42 km/h 0.2 mm Extreme 54
31 May after 26.5 °C 15 % 42 km/h 1.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 May 2017
After · 15 May 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 · 442Every 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 United States ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pinal fire last?
It burned between 8 May 2017 and 8 May 2017: 1 day, according to the start date recorded by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) and the heat detections seen by satellite.
How much area did it burn?
The official perimeter published by United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC) is 3,224 hectares (32.2 km²). Other tallies, such as daily incident reports, may give slightly different figures.
Which counties burned?
The fire only entered Gila (3,207 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.6 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 78 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the official burnt perimeter of United States agencies (MTBS / NIFC, public domain), NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of United States. 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

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 911.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter is official and in the public domain. For past years it comes from MTBS (Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity), run by the U.S. Geological Survey and the USDA Forest Service, which map it on Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery. For the current and last year it comes from WFIGS at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC): incident perimeters mapped by fire crews, aircraft and imagery. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. County boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per county is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from official figures.