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Placetas fire, April 2020 Placetas, Santa Clara

Out · last detection 14 Apr 2020, 17:56 UTC

The fire started on 6 April 2020 in Placetas, Cuba, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,199 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 14th largest in Villa Clara since 2016 (of 20 with a page). Number 30 in Cuba in 2020, of 53.

Burnt area
1,199ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
6 Apr 2020 – 14 Apr 2020
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
6 Apr
2020
Heat detections
55
in a single hotspot: 166 MW
Danger at start
22
High · FWI index
Energy released
878MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

14 Apr 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Apr14 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

67891011121314

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
41km/h · peak gust
32%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days 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. Placetas where it started
    660 ha reached on 6 Apr
    1.0 %
  2. Santa Clara
    545 ha reached on 6 Apr
    0.8 %

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)
6 Apr 32.0 °C 37 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
7 Apr 31.6 °C 40 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
8 Apr 32.1 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
9 Apr 33.5 °C 36 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
10 Apr 34.6 °C 33 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
11 Apr 33.3 °C 38 % 29 km/h 0.1 mm High 26
12 Apr 34.3 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
13 Apr 33.6 °C 40 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
14 Apr 33.6 °C 38 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
15 Apr after 32.9 °C 40 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
16 Apr after 33.2 °C 41 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
17 Apr after 32.1 °C 43 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
18 Apr after 33.4 °C 38 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
19 Apr after 34.0 °C 33 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
20 Apr after 32.6 °C 43 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
21 Apr after 31.5 °C 49 % 32 km/h 0.4 mm High 26
22 Apr after 31.1 °C 51 % 26 km/h 0.5 mm High 24
23 Apr after 33.4 °C 38 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
24 Apr after 32.2 °C 49 % 52 km/h 0.2 mm High 32

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Mar 2020
After · 21 Apr 2020

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 · 55Every 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 Cuba ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Placetas fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 April 2020 and 14 April 2020: 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 1,199 hectares (12.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Placetas (660 ha, 1.0 %); Santa Clara (545 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.6 °C, humidity dropped to 32 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Cuba (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: 105

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 105.

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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.