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São José do Peixe fire, July 2016 São José do Peixe, São Francisco do Piauí, São Miguel do Fidalgo

Out · last detection 26 Aug 2016, 15:48 UTC

The fire started on 27 July 2016 in São José do Peixe, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 31 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 12,749 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 77th largest in Piaui since 2016 (of 805 with a page). Number 61 in Brazil in 2016, of 649.

Compare with…

Suggestions: São Miguel do Fidalgo · 2021Santo Inácio do Piauí · 2018Nazaré do Piauí · 2018Campinas do Piauí · 2020

Burnt area
12,749ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
31days
27 Jul 2016 – 26 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
27 Jul
2016
Heat detections
636
in a single hotspot: 82 MW
Danger at start
48
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
172MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Jul26 Aug
26 Aug 2016

How it evolved, day by day

27 Jul 2016 · 17 MW · 3 28 Jul 2016 · 112 MW · 14 29 Jul 2016 · 11 MW · 2 30 Jul 2016 · 42 MW · 8 31 Jul 2016 · 2 MW · 2 2 Aug 2016 · 15 MW · 2 3 Aug 2016 · 36 MW · 8 4 Aug 2016 · 93 MW · 11 5 Aug 2016 · 13 MW · 5 6 Aug 2016 · 14 MW · 5 7 Aug 2016 · 128 MW · 31 8 Aug 2016 · 236 MW · 27 9 Aug 2016 · 298 MW · 39 10 Aug 2016 · 63 MW · 8 11 Aug 2016 · 238 MW · 17 12 Aug 2016 · 93 MW · 21 13 Aug 2016 · 612 MW · 70 14 Aug 2016 · 435 MW · 52 15 Aug 2016 · 717 MW · 69 16 Aug 2016 · 263 MW · 48 17 Aug 2016 · 84 MW · 18 18 Aug 2016 · 125 MW · 23 19 Aug 2016 · 122 MW · 24 20 Aug 2016 · 19 MW · 4 21 Aug 2016 · 123 MW · 16 22 Aug 2016 · 982 MW · 46 23 Aug 2016 · 113 MW · 32 24 Aug 2016 · 113 MW · 24 25 Aug 2016 · 45 MW · 6 26 Aug 2016 · 3 MW · 1
27 Jul 2 Aug 7 Aug 12 Aug 17 Aug 22 Aug

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
59km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 8.1% of the area of London (127 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. São José do Peixe 3,297 inhabitants where it started
    10,069 ha reached on 27 Jul
    7.8 %
  2. São Francisco do Piauí 5,392 inhabitants
    2,552 ha reached on 14 Aug
    1.9 %
  3. São Miguel do Fidalgo 2,829 inhabitants
    210 ha reached on 30 Jul
    0.3 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2015
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2015, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

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)
27 Jul 33.7 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
28 Jul 34.7 °C 27 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
29 Jul 34.4 °C 31 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
30 Jul 33.3 °C 27 % 59 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
31 Jul 33.6 °C 22 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
1 Aug 33.1 °C 32 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
2 Aug 34.1 °C 28 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Aug 35.2 °C 21 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
4 Aug 34.6 °C 17 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
5 Aug 34.5 °C 27 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
6 Aug 35.1 °C 23 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
7 Aug 35.9 °C 20 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
8 Aug 36.3 °C 24 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
9 Aug 36.2 °C 24 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
10 Aug 37.7 °C 22 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
11 Aug 37.8 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
12 Aug 37.8 °C 21 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
13 Aug 36.1 °C 16 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
14 Aug 36.0 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
15 Aug 37.2 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
16 Aug 37.4 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
17 Aug 39.6 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
18 Aug 38.0 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
19 Aug 35.8 °C 22 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
20 Aug 35.8 °C 30 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
21 Aug 36.9 °C 26 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
22 Aug 40.4 °C 14 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
23 Aug 37.0 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
24 Aug 36.0 °C 24 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
25 Aug 35.7 °C 26 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
26 Aug 35.3 °C 27 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
27 Aug after 36.8 °C 26 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
28 Aug after 35.2 °C 24 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
29 Aug after 35.4 °C 28 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
30 Aug after 37.2 °C 21 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
31 Aug after 36.7 °C 27 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55
1 Sept after 37.1 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
2 Sept after 35.8 °C 23 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
3 Sept after 34.7 °C 25 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
4 Sept after 34.1 °C 27 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
5 Sept after 36.5 °C 26 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Jul 2016
After · 2 Sept 2016

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 · 636Every 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 São José do Peixe fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 27 July 2016 to 26 August 2016 (31 days). The perimeter dates it from 27 July 2016 to 25 August 2016.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 12,749 hectares (127.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: São José do Peixe (10,069 ha, 7.8 %); São Francisco do Piauí (2,552 ha, 1.9 %); São Miguel do Fidalgo (210 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 40.4 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 59 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
  1. Last day with fire: 25 August 2016 → 26 August 2016.

RSS Changes to this page

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 27 July 2016 to 25 August 2016. 636 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • We have not matched this page with any official record.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
  • Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2015, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.