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Puerto Suárez fire, December 2016 Puerto Suárez

Out · last detection 11 Jan 2017, 17:38 UTC

The fire started on 28 December 2016 in Puerto Suárez, Bolivia, and satellites saw it burning for 17 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 15,983 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 139th largest in Santa Cruz since 2016 (of 834 with a page). Number 15 in Bolivia in 2016, of 187.

Burnt area
15,983ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
17days
28 Dec 2016 – 13 Jan 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
28 Dec
2016
Heat detections
388
in a single hotspot: 39 MW
Danger at start
0
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
3.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Jan 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Dec13 Jan

How it evolved, day by day

282930311234567891011

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
58km/h · peak gust
35%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.8 mm on 16 Jan.

This area had burned before

1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 182 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Puerto Suárez 33,006 inhabitants where it started
    12,876 ha
    1.0 %

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)
28 Dec 31.4 °C 66 % 31 km/h 7.8 mm Very low 0
29 Dec 35.6 °C 46 % 27 km/h 0.3 mm Very low 2
30 Dec 35.5 °C 47 % 35 km/h 1.3 mm Very low 4
31 Dec 35.3 °C 53 % 51 km/h 1.0 mm Very low 5
1 Jan 37.8 °C 39 % 58 km/h 0.1 mm Low 10
2 Jan 34.4 °C 58 % 32 km/h 2.7 mm Very low 2
3 Jan 35.0 °C 47 % 34 km/h 3.9 mm Very low 1
4 Jan 35.7 °C 50 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
5 Jan 33.9 °C 50 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
6 Jan 36.2 °C 47 % 46 km/h 3.0 mm Very low 3
7 Jan 35.9 °C 48 % 38 km/h 0.5 mm Low 7
8 Jan 37.3 °C 39 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
9 Jan 37.8 °C 36 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 15
10 Jan 38.1 °C 35 % 50 km/h 0.7 mm Moderate 15
11 Jan 36.3 °C 39 % 24 km/h 0.2 mm Low 11
12 Jan 35.6 °C 44 % 19 km/h 2.7 mm Very low 4
13 Jan 36.4 °C 42 % 20 km/h 2.8 mm Very low 3
14 Jan after 36.9 °C 40 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Low 11
15 Jan after 38.0 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 13
16 Jan after 37.2 °C 41 % 31 km/h 2.8 mm Low 6

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Dec 2016
After · 20 Jan 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 · 388Every 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 Bolivia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Puerto Suárez fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 December 2016 and 13 January 2017: 17 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 15,983 hectares (159.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Puerto Suárez (12,876 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 38.1 °C, humidity dropped to 35 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 15, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Bolivia (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: 119 · 110

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 119 · 110.

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 ADM3 (Public Domain). 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.