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Planaltina fire, August 2019 Planaltina

Out · last detection 17 Aug 2019, 16:23 UTC

The fire started on 12 August 2019 in Planaltina, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,830 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 380th largest in Goiás since 2016 (of 548 with a page). Number 679 in Brazil in 2019, of 974.

Burnt area
3,830ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
6days
12 Aug 2019 – 17 Aug 2019
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
12 Aug
2019
Heat detections
121
in a single hotspot: 39 MW
Danger at start
31
High · FWI index
Energy released
845MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Aug 2019
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Aug17 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

121314151617

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
55km/h · peak gust
23%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

90% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,341 ha in 2016, 2,667 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,454 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Planaltina 105,031 inhabitants where it started
    3,855 ha reached on 12 Aug
    1.5 %

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)
12 Aug 29.1 °C 29 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Aug 29.4 °C 23 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Aug 27.9 °C 23 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Aug 26.3 °C 35 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
16 Aug 25.8 °C 38 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
17 Aug 26.5 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Aug after 28.1 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
19 Aug after 30.0 °C 28 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
20 Aug after 31.1 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
21 Aug after 31.5 °C 25 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 Aug after 30.7 °C 26 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
23 Aug after 30.6 °C 30 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
24 Aug after 30.7 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 Aug after 30.2 °C 25 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
26 Aug after 27.8 °C 32 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
27 Aug after 28.1 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
28 Aug after 29.0 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
29 Aug after 29.4 °C 32 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
30 Aug after 30.6 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Aug 2019
After · 24 Aug 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 · 121Every 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 Planaltina fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 12 August 2019 and 17 August 2019: 6 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 3,830 hectares (38.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Planaltina (3,855 ha, 1.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 40, class Very high.
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.

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 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.