Reyes fire, August 2023 Reyes
The fire started on 19 August 2023 in Reyes, Bolivia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,515 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 512th largest in Beni since 2016 (of 902 with a page). Number 143 in Bolivia in 2023, of 248.
- Burnt area
- 4,515ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 8days
- 19 Aug 2023 – 26 Aug 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 19 Aug
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 134
- in a single hotspot: 51 MW
- Danger at start
- 27
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.6GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 3 Sept.
This area had burned before
47% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 947 ha in 2016, 704 ha in 2018, 1,020 ha in 2019, 44 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,116 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
4,531 ha0.4 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Aug | 37.5 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 20 Aug | 38.3 °C | 35 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 21 Aug | 38.1 °C | 36 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 22 Aug | 39.0 °C | 33 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 23 Aug | 38.5 °C | 33 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 24 Aug | 39.4 °C | 29 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 25 Aug | 39.0 °C | 33 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 26 Aug | 36.1 °C | 31 % | 31 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 35 |
| 27 Aug after | 30.9 °C | 37 % | 34 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 34 |
| 28 Aug after | 34.2 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 29 Aug after | 37.5 °C | 36 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 30 Aug after | 38.1 °C | 38 % | 33 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 32 |
| 31 Aug after | 37.9 °C | 38 % | 38 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 34 |
| 1 Sept after | 36.6 °C | 43 % | 42 km/h | 0.8 mm | High 28 |
| 2 Sept after | 37.8 °C | 34 % | 49 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 36 |
| 3 Sept after | 36.3 °C | 41 % | 50 km/h | 1.4 mm | High 27 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 27 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 38 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 134Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 7,203 haReyesAugust 2019 · 6 days · 5 km away
- 5,438 haReyesOctober 2025 · 2 days · 14 km away
- 11,510 haReyes5 September 2022 · 5 days · 15 km away
- 5,121 haReyes1 September 2022 · 5 days · 18 km away
- 5,187 haSanta Rosa5 September 2022 · 3 days · 23 km away
- 8,691 haReyesSeptember 2017 · 8 days · 32 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Reyes fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 August 2023 and 26 August 2023: 8 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 4,515 hectares (45.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Reyes (4,531 ha, 0.4 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 39.4 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 46 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 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
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.