Skip to content
worldfires
BR · Brazil · →

Poxoréu fire, 7 September 2024 Poxoréu, Tesouro

Out · last detection 19 Sept 2024, 16:48 UTC

The fire started on 7 September 2024 in Poxoréu, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 43,283 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 66th largest in Mato Grosso since 2016 (of 1996 with a page). Number 63 in Brazil in 2024, of 1301.

Burnt area
43,283ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
7 Sept 2024 – 19 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
7 Sept
2024
Heat detections
2,043
in a single hotspot: 419 MW
Danger at start
57
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
21.3GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

19 Sept 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Sept19 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

78910111213141516171819

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

The weather it burned in

40°high
49km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.4 mm on 28 Sept.

This area had burned before

27% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 7,368 ha in 2017, 2,302 ha in 2019, 4,580 ha in 2020, 1,196 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 11,474 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Poxoréu 23,283 inhabitants where it started
    42,879 ha reached on 7 Sept
    6.2 %
  2. Tesouro 3,025 inhabitants
    681 ha reached on 14 Sept
    0.2 %

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)
3 Sept 37.6 °C 12 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
4 Sept 38.0 °C 9 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
5 Sept 37.2 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
6 Sept 37.5 °C 13 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
7 Sept 38.0 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
8 Sept 37.1 °C 11 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
9 Sept 36.3 °C 13 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
10 Sept 36.9 °C 14 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
11 Sept 37.1 °C 13 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
12 Sept 37.9 °C 13 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
13 Sept 38.4 °C 14 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
14 Sept 38.6 °C 14 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
15 Sept 38.3 °C 15 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 Sept 35.2 °C 26 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
17 Sept 36.6 °C 22 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
18 Sept 38.7 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
19 Sept 37.4 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
20 Sept after 38.6 °C 19 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
21 Sept after 38.6 °C 14 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
22 Sept after 39.4 °C 13 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
23 Sept after 39.6 °C 14 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
24 Sept after 40.2 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
25 Sept after 38.1 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
26 Sept after 39.3 °C 15 % 46 km/h 0.3 mm Extreme 60
27 Sept after 33.8 °C 41 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
28 Sept after 33.0 °C 40 % 34 km/h 2.4 mm Moderate 16

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 31 Aug 2024
After · 26 Sept 2024

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 15 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 130 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 92: 6.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak130 µg/m³
Days over the guideline21 days
PM10187 µg/m³
Optical depth3.23
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 2,043Every 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 Poxoréu fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 September 2024 and 19 September 2024: 13 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 43,283 hectares (432.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Poxoréu (42,879 ha, 6.2 %); Tesouro (681 ha, 0.2 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.2 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 67, 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.

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.