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Temósachic fire, 27 May 2021 Temósachic, Ocampo, Yécora

Out · last detection 20 Jun 2021, 21:20 UTC

The fire started on 27 May 2021 in Temósachic, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 25 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 16,100 hectares from heat detections, spread across 4 municipalities.

It is the 8th largest in Chihuahua since 2016 (of 235 with a page). Number 3 in Mexico in 2021, of 295.

Burnt area
16,100ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
25days
27 May 2021 – 20 Jun 2021
Municipalities hit
4
municipalities
Started on
27 May
2021
Heat detections
1,330
in a single hotspot: 91 MW
Danger at start
39
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
9.4GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Jun 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 May20 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

2728293031124567891011121314151617181920

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
58km/h · peak gust
8%lowest humidity

It had gone 15 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.3 mm on 21 Jun.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Temósachic where it started
    11,296 ha reached on 27 May
    2.6 %
  2. Ocampo
    2,816 ha reached on 30 May
    1.6 %
  3. Yécora
    1,131 ha reached on 14 Jun
    0.4 %
  4. Moris
    881 ha reached on 11 Jun
    0.5 %

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.

Official record

According to CONAFOR, 3 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 10,603 ha (the satellite measured 16,100 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

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)
27 May 25.1 °C 18 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
28 May 26.8 °C 13 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
29 May 25.8 °C 14 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
30 May 24.1 °C 19 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
31 May 24.7 °C 17 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
1 Jun 26.1 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
2 Jun 24.3 °C 25 % 46 km/h 1.2 mm High 25
3 Jun 24.2 °C 21 % 42 km/h 0.3 mm High 30
4 Jun 27.0 °C 17 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
5 Jun 26.5 °C 15 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
6 Jun 27.1 °C 19 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
7 Jun 27.2 °C 16 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
8 Jun 28.0 °C 18 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
9 Jun 29.9 °C 19 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
10 Jun 32.0 °C 13 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
11 Jun 33.1 °C 16 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
12 Jun 34.4 °C 15 % 48 km/h 0.4 mm Very high 43
13 Jun 33.1 °C 8 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
14 Jun 32.8 °C 13 % 50 km/h 0.2 mm Extreme 53
15 Jun 27.3 °C 40 % 47 km/h 1.6 mm Moderate 16
16 Jun 30.7 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Jun 29.2 °C 21 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
18 Jun 30.5 °C 15 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
19 Jun 30.4 °C 23 % 58 km/h 0.5 mm Very high 44
20 Jun 25.6 °C 41 % 45 km/h 5.5 mm Low 5
21 Jun after 26.5 °C 41 % 42 km/h 2.3 mm Low 7

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 May 2021
After · 27 Jun 2021

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 · 1,330Every 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 Temósachic fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 May 2021 and 20 June 2021: 25 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 16,100 hectares (161.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 4 municipalities: Temósachic (11,296 ha, 2.6 %); Ocampo (2,816 ha, 1.6 %); Yécora (1,131 ha, 0.4 %); Moris (881 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.4 °C, humidity dropped to 8 % and gusts hit 58 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
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
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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 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 (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.