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Silca fire, April 2024 Silca, Manto, Salamá

Out · last detection 8 May 2024, 18:52 UTC

The fire started on 29 April 2024 in Silca, Honduras, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,365 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 47th largest in Olancho since 2016 (of 227 with a page). Number 13 in Honduras in 2024, of 94.

The power measured by the satellite is low (23.8 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
2,365ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
29 Apr 2024 – 8 May 2024
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
29 Apr
2024
Heat detections
114
in a single hotspot: 24 MW
Danger at start
18
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
472MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

8 May 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Apr8 May

How it evolved, day by day

3012345678

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
46km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 16 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 23 May.

This area had burned before

79% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,798 ha in 2019, 169 ha in 2020. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,869 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Silca where it started
    1,460 ha reached on 1 May
    5.7 %
  2. Manto
    706 ha reached on 22 Apr
    1.4 %
  3. Salamá
    213 ha reached on 6 May
    0.6 %

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)
22 Apr 34.2 °C 30 % 38 km/h 2.3 mm Moderate 18
23 Apr 34.4 °C 30 % 38 km/h 0.6 mm High 28
24 Apr 31.5 °C 42 % 37 km/h 1.4 mm Moderate 16
25 Apr 33.3 °C 34 % 39 km/h 0.7 mm High 25
26 Apr 33.6 °C 32 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
27 Apr 31.8 °C 46 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
28 Apr 33.2 °C 37 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm High 27
29 Apr 34.9 °C 34 % 39 km/h 0.1 mm High 30
30 Apr 35.1 °C 34 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 29
1 May 35.9 °C 27 % 31 km/h 0.1 mm High 32
2 May 36.7 °C 24 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
3 May 36.8 °C 28 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 May 36.7 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
5 May 34.9 °C 35 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
6 May 35.9 °C 29 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 May 35.6 °C 31 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
8 May 34.1 °C 37 % 35 km/h 0.1 mm High 34
9 May after 34.2 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.2 mm High 38
10 May after 36.0 °C 30 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
11 May after 34.1 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 May after 34.9 °C 33 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 May after 34.5 °C 38 % 43 km/h 0.6 mm High 30
14 May after 34.6 °C 30 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 May after 35.1 °C 34 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
16 May after 34.0 °C 38 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm High 34
17 May after 35.5 °C 36 % 38 km/h 0.4 mm High 34
18 May after 36.0 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.3 mm Very high 38
19 May after 34.7 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
20 May after 35.3 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
21 May after 36.0 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
22 May after 35.6 °C 32 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
23 May after 33.1 °C 44 % 27 km/h 1.2 mm Moderate 20

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Apr 2024
After · 15 May 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 9 May 2024 the air beside the fire reached 50 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 29: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak50 µg/m³
Days over the guideline13 days
PM1073 µg/m³
Optical depth1.63
272829301234567891011
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 · 114Every 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 Honduras ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Silca fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 29 April 2024 and 8 May 2024: 10 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 2,365 hectares (23.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Silca (1,460 ha, 5.7 %); Manto (706 ha, 1.4 %); Salamá (213 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.8 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 38, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Honduras (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: 911

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 911.

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 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.