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Pullampeta fire, April 2017 Obulavaripalle, Pullampeta, T Sundupalle

Out · last detection 17 Apr 2017, 20:11 UTC

The fire started on 6 April 2017 in Pullampeta, India, and satellites saw it burning for 11 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,001 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 24th largest in Andhra Pradesh since 2016 (of 30 with a page). Number 19 in India in 2017, of 27.

Burnt area
6,001ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
11days
6 Apr 2017 – 16 Apr 2017
Municipalities hit
3
subdistricts
Started on
6 Apr
2017
Heat detections
172
in a single hotspot: 84 MW
Danger at start
41
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Apr 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Apr16 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

67891011121314151617

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
45km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

36% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,159 ha in 2016.

What happened to each town

  1. Obulavaripalle
    3,282 ha reached on 10 Apr
    7.0 %
  2. Pullampeta where it started
    2,000 ha reached on 5 Apr
    5.0 %
  3. T Sundupalle
    753 ha reached on 11 Apr
    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)
5 Apr 37.7 °C 28 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
6 Apr 37.7 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
7 Apr 38.5 °C 23 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Apr 39.3 °C 24 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
9 Apr 37.9 °C 25 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Apr 38.5 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
11 Apr 37.9 °C 27 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
12 Apr 38.0 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
13 Apr 37.9 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
14 Apr 36.9 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
15 Apr 38.6 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Apr 39.7 °C 19 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
17 Apr after 40.0 °C 21 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
18 Apr after 40.0 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Apr after 40.0 °C 20 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
20 Apr after 38.8 °C 26 % 36 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 48
21 Apr after 38.3 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 47
22 Apr after 39.3 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
23 Apr after 39.7 °C 18 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
24 Apr after 40.0 °C 21 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
25 Apr after 39.7 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 52
26 Apr after 39.6 °C 23 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
27 Apr after 40.1 °C 21 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Mar 2017
After · 23 Apr 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 · 172Every 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 India ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pullampeta fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 April 2017 and 16 April 2017: 11 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 6,001 hectares (60.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Obulavaripalle (3,282 ha, 7.0 %); Pullampeta (2,000 ha, 5.0 %); T Sundupalle (753 ha, 1.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.0 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of India (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: 112

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 112.

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 (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.