How long did the Tinaco fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 February 2026 and 4 March 2026: 6 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 2,461 hectares (24.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 2 municipalities: Tinaco (1,918 ha, 1.8 %); Pao de San Juan Bautista (561 ha, 0.1 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.

Where does this data come from?

From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Venezuela (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

VE · Venezuela · 2026-02-27 → 2026-03-04

Tinaco fire, February 2026 Tinaco, Pao de San Juan Bautista

Out · last detection 4 Mar 2026, 06:40 UTC

The fire started on 27 February 2026 in Tinaco, Venezuela, and satellites saw it burning for 6 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,461 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 84th largest in Cojedes since 2016 (of 219 with a page). Number 172 in Venezuela in 2026, of 396.

Burnt area: 2,461ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 6days; 27 Feb 2026 – 4 Mar 2026
Municipalities hit: 2; municipalities
Started on: 27 Feb; 2026
Heat detections: 50; in a single hotspot: 37 MW
Danger at start: 38; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 203MW; sum of detected power

Play back 4 Mar 2026

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Feb4 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

27281234

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

The weather it burned in

36°high

40km/h · peak gust

22%lowest humidity

It had gone 27 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

92% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,150 ha in 2016, 1,025 ha in 2019, 1,102 ha in 2020, 1,243 ha in 2022, 1,577 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,261 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

Tinaco 32,564 inhabitants where it started

1,918 ha reached on 27 Feb

1.8 %
Pao de San Juan Bautista 16,810 inhabitants

561 ha reached on 28 Feb

0.1 %

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)
27 Feb	34.6 °C	26 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
28 Feb	35.1 °C	25 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
1 Mar	35.5 °C	25 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
2 Mar	35.9 °C	23 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
3 Mar	36.3 °C	22 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
4 Mar	34.1 °C	29 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
5 Mar after	35.4 °C	26 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
6 Mar after	35.2 °C	26 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
7 Mar after	35.1 °C	25 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
8 Mar after	36.0 °C	21 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 44
9 Mar after	35.5 °C	28 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
10 Mar after	35.8 °C	24 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
11 Mar after	34.4 °C	27 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 45
12 Mar after	35.2 °C	29 %	34 km/h	0.1 mm	Very high 43
13 Mar after	34.8 °C	30 %	36 km/h	0.2 mm	Very high 44
14 Mar after	35.6 °C	28 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 20 Feb 2026

After · 11 Mar 2026

Before After

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 February 2026 the air beside the fire reached 30 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak30 µg/m³

Days over the guideline5 days

PM1036 µg/m³

Optical depth0.37

WHO 15

252627281234567

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 · 50Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Venezuela ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tinaco fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 27 February 2026 and 4 March 2026: 6 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 2,461 hectares (24.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 2 municipalities: Tinaco (1,918 ha, 1.8 %); Pao de San Juan Bautista (561 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 36.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 42, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?: From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Venezuela (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

Protección Civil ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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What really happened?

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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 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.

Where it burned