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Tamazula fire, 14 May 2023 Tamazula

Out · last detection 25 May 2023, 19:40 UTC

The fire started on 14 May 2023 in Tamazula, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 12 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,111 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality. According to CONAFOR, it was detected on 17 May 2023 and declared extinguished on 31 May 2023.

It is the 144th largest in Durango since 2016 (of 239 with a page). Number 167 in Mexico in 2023, of 285.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Tamazula · 2021Tamazula · 2017Cosalá · 2018Tamazula · 2018

Burnt area
2,111ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
12days
14 May 2023 – 25 May 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
14 May
2023
Heat detections
122
in a single hotspot: 99 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
103MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 14 May25 May
25 May 2023

How it evolved, day by day

17 May 2023 · 21 MW · 16 18 May 2023 · 362 MW · 16 19 May 2023 · 1 MW · 1 21 May 2023 · 55 MW · 13 22 May 2023 · 63 MW · 11 23 May 2023 · 184 MW · 23 24 May 2023 · 109 MW · 30 25 May 2023 · 27 MW · 12
17 May 18 May 19 May 22 May 24 May

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
54km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 56 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

62% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 816 ha in 2017, 851 ha in 2021, 65 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,312 ha that had burned before.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.3% of the area of London (21 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. Tamazula where it started
    2,117 ha reached on 17 May
    0.4 %

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.

Official record

According to CONAFOR, this fire started on 17 May 2023 and burned 1,995 ha (the satellite measured 2,111 ha).

CONAFOR (Comisión Nacional Forestal), estadística de incendios forestales en datos.gob.mx (CC BY 4.0). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

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)
14 May 25.8 °C 20 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
15 May 27.2 °C 14 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
16 May 26.7 °C 16 % 54 km/h 0.1 mm Very high 44
17 May 25.2 °C 24 % 45 km/h 1.1 mm High 25
18 May 26.3 °C 26 % 49 km/h 0.7 mm High 28
19 May 25.7 °C 24 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
20 May 27.2 °C 19 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
21 May 30.8 °C 13 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
22 May 30.2 °C 12 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
23 May 29.5 °C 15 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
24 May 28.8 °C 15 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
25 May 29.0 °C 12 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
26 May after 29.5 °C 13 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
27 May after 27.5 °C 25 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
28 May after 26.3 °C 23 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
29 May after 26.5 °C 23 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
30 May after 27.5 °C 24 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
31 May after 28.6 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Jun after 27.7 °C 32 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Jun after 29.2 °C 34 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Jun after 27.9 °C 23 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Jun after 30.0 °C 24 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 35

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 7 May 2023
After · 1 Jun 2023

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 25 May 2023 the air beside the fire reached 34 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak34 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM1050 µg/m³
Optical depth0.46
1516171819202122232425262728
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 · 122Every 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 Mexico ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tamazula fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 14 May 2023 to 25 May 2023 (12 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 May 2023 to 25 May 2023. According to CONAFOR, it was detected on 17 May 2023 and declared extinguished on 31 May 2023.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 2,111 hectares (21.1 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Tamazula (2,117 ha, 0.4 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 54 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Mexico (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.

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 17 May 2023 to 25 May 2023. 122 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • Compared with CONAFOR: 1,995 official ha against 2,111 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

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 4.0 (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.