Skip to content
worldfires
MX · Mexico · →

Tepic fire, April 2023 Xalisco, Tepic

Out · last detection 24 Apr 2023, 08:09 UTC

The fire started on 16 April 2023 in Tepic, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,247 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 58th largest in Nayarit since 2016 (of 179 with a page). Number 94 in Mexico in 2023, of 286.

Burnt area
3,247ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
16 Apr 2023 – 24 Apr 2023
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
16 Apr
2023
Heat detections
221
in a single hotspot: 123 MW
Danger at start
16
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
1.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

24 Apr 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Apr24 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

161718192021222324

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

The weather it burned in

20°high
41km/h · peak gust
31%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,758 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Xalisco 65,229 inhabitants
    1,775 ha reached on 18 Apr
    3.5 %
  2. Tepic 425,924 inhabitants where it started
    1,487 ha reached on 16 Apr
    0.9 %

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 15 April 2023 and burned 2,212 ha (the satellite measured 3,247 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)
15 Apr 19.7 °C 34 % 35 km/h 0.8 mm Moderate 16
16 Apr 20.3 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
17 Apr 19.2 °C 34 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
18 Apr 18.6 °C 38 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
19 Apr 17.9 °C 45 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
20 Apr 18.5 °C 44 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
21 Apr 19.0 °C 46 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
22 Apr 20.2 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
23 Apr 19.2 °C 39 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
24 Apr 19.1 °C 31 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
25 Apr after 18.4 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
26 Apr after 18.0 °C 34 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
27 Apr after 18.9 °C 36 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
28 Apr after 17.8 °C 46 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
29 Apr after 18.4 °C 42 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
30 Apr after 17.6 °C 51 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
1 May after 17.9 °C 45 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
2 May after 18.7 °C 40 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
3 May after 19.6 °C 31 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
4 May after 20.2 °C 33 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 23

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Apr 2023
After · 1 May 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 20 April 2023 the air beside the fire reached 108 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 62: 4.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak108 µg/m³
Days over the guideline6 days
PM10156 µg/m³
Optical depth0.59
1415161718192021222324252627
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 · 221Every 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 Tepic fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 16 April 2023 and 24 April 2023: 9 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 3,247 hectares (32.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Xalisco (1,775 ha, 3.5 %); Tepic (1,487 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 20.3 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 21, class Moderate.
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.

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.