Tocantínia fire, September 2026 Tocantínia
The fire started on 19 September 2026 in Tocantínia, Brazil, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,173 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 774th largest in Tocantins since 2016 (of 1242 with a page). Number 462 in Brazil in 2026, of 747.
- Burnt area
- 4,173ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 19 Sept 2026 – 23 Sept 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 19 Sept
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 60
- in a single hotspot: 63 MW
- Danger at start
- 42
- Very high · FWI index
- Energy released
- 828MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 41.4 mm on 2 Oct.
This area had burned before
88% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 2,225 ha in 2017, 473 ha in 2019, 2,174 ha in 2020, 2,349 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,679 ha that had burned before.
- 2,174 ha Pedro Afonso fire, September 2020 14,002 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,653 ha Tocantínia fire, August 2022 3,117 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,566 ha Tocantínia fire, August 2017 7,307 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
4,197 ha reached on 19 Sept1.6 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Sept | 38.2 °C | 20 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 20 Sept | 37.8 °C | 22 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 21 Sept | 38.2 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 22 Sept | 38.3 °C | 26 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 23 Sept | 39.1 °C | 25 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 24 Sept after | 38.2 °C | 32 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 25 Sept after | 29.5 °C | 64 % | 25 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 26 Sept after | 33.9 °C | 46 % | 20 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 27 Sept after | 37.2 °C | 33 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 28 Sept after | 37.7 °C | 29 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 29 Sept after | 37.5 °C | 34 % | 30 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 34 |
| 30 Sept after | 35.8 °C | 39 % | 23 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 30 |
| 1 Oct after | 36.5 °C | 38 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 2 Oct after | 31.3 °C | 67 % | 25 km/h | 41.4 mm | Very low 0 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 22 September 2026 the air beside the fire reached 54 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 28: 1.9 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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 · 60Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Tocantínia fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 19 September 2026 and 23 September 2026: 5 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 4,173 hectares (41.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Tocantínia (4,197 ha, 1.6 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 39.1 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 39 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 Brazil (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: 193
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
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 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). 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.