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Topia fire, 15 May 2018 Topia

Out · last detection 27 May 2018, 19:38 UTC

The fire started on 15 May 2018 in Topia, Mexico, and satellites saw it burning for 13 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,716 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 198th largest in Durango since 2016 (of 241 with a page). Number 192 in Mexico in 2018, of 235.

Burnt area
1,716ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
13days
15 May 2018 – 27 May 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
15 May
2018
Heat detections
116
in a single hotspot: 44 MW
Danger at start
16
Moderate · FWI index
Energy released
847MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

27 May 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 May27 May

How it evolved, day by day

15161718192021222324252627

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
52km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.2 mm on 1 Jun.

This area had burned before

27% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 467 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Topia where it started
    1,723 ha reached on 15 May
    1.0 %

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)
15 May 29.5 °C 33 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
16 May 29.3 °C 34 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
17 May 29.5 °C 34 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
18 May 27.5 °C 24 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
19 May 27.7 °C 22 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
20 May 28.6 °C 21 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
21 May 27.9 °C 21 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
22 May 27.6 °C 24 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
23 May 28.8 °C 25 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
24 May 31.3 °C 18 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
25 May 32.1 °C 22 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
26 May 32.0 °C 32 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
27 May 31.6 °C 30 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
28 May after 31.9 °C 32 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
29 May after 32.3 °C 30 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
30 May after 32.6 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
31 May after 33.7 °C 32 % 45 km/h 0.6 mm High 27
1 Jun after 32.6 °C 33 % 42 km/h 3.2 mm Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 May 2018
After · 3 Jun 2018

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 · 116Every 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 Topia fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 15 May 2018 and 27 May 2018: 13 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 1,716 hectares (17.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Topia (1,723 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.1 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
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.

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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.