Skip to content
worldfires
HN · Honduras · →

Tocoa fire, 8 April 2020 Tocoa

Out · last detection 18 Apr 2020, 07:10 UTC

The fire started on 8 April 2020 in Tocoa, Honduras, and satellites saw it burning for 10 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,292 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 2th largest in Colón since 2016 (of 24 with a page). Number 58 in Honduras in 2020, of 174.

Burnt area
2,292ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
10days
8 Apr 2020 – 17 Apr 2020
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
8 Apr
2020
Heat detections
117
in a single hotspot: 838 MW
Danger at start
17
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
536MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Apr 2020
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Apr17 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

891011121314151718

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
43km/h · peak gust
22%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.5 mm on 28 Apr.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Tocoa where it started
    2,304 ha reached on 2 Apr
    2.6 %

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)
2 Apr 31.3 °C 35 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
3 Apr 32.5 °C 41 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 17
4 Apr 32.2 °C 40 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 18
5 Apr 32.7 °C 34 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
6 Apr 32.9 °C 39 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
7 Apr 32.9 °C 40 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
8 Apr 33.3 °C 36 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 21
9 Apr 33.4 °C 33 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 20
10 Apr 34.4 °C 28 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
11 Apr 33.7 °C 26 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
12 Apr 34.0 °C 28 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Apr 35.3 °C 31 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
14 Apr 34.7 °C 22 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
15 Apr 33.6 °C 32 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Apr 33.5 °C 31 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
17 Apr 32.8 °C 31 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
18 Apr after 33.3 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Apr after 34.7 °C 28 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
20 Apr after 35.0 °C 33 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
21 Apr after 32.8 °C 42 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
22 Apr after 34.3 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
23 Apr after 34.6 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
24 Apr after 35.3 °C 33 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
25 Apr after 34.1 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
26 Apr after 33.6 °C 33 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
27 Apr after 33.7 °C 32 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
28 Apr after 31.1 °C 36 % 38 km/h 1.5 mm Moderate 20

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 1 Apr 2020
After · 24 Apr 2020

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 · 117Every 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 Honduras ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tocoa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 8 April 2020 and 17 April 2020: 10 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 2,292 hectares (22.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Tocoa (2,304 ha, 2.6 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 35.3 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Honduras (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 International (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.