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VE · Venezuela · →

Uracoa fire, April 2018 Libertador, Uracoa

Out · last detection 6 Apr 2018, 17:08 UTC

The fire started on 2 April 2018 in Uracoa, Venezuela, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,944 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 27th largest in Monagas since 2016 (of 165 with a page). Number 7 in Venezuela in 2018, of 107.

Burnt area
5,944ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
2 Apr 2018 – 6 Apr 2018
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
2 Apr
2018
Heat detections
299
in a single hotspot: 44 MW
Danger at start
35
High · FWI index
Energy released
2.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Apr 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Apr6 Apr

How it evolved, day by day

23456

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
45km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.2 mm on 14 Apr.

This area had burned before

85% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 4,989 ha in 2016, 421 ha in 2017. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 5,043 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Libertador 45,274 inhabitants
    4,246 ha reached on 2 Apr
    1.3 %
  2. Uracoa 9,625 inhabitants where it started
    1,734 ha reached on 2 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.

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 36.3 °C 30 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
3 Apr 34.6 °C 43 % 44 km/h 0.8 mm High 24
4 Apr 36.0 °C 40 % 38 km/h 1.7 mm Moderate 19
5 Apr 35.1 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.1 mm High 28
6 Apr 36.4 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
7 Apr after 34.8 °C 35 % 42 km/h 0.1 mm High 36
8 Apr after 35.6 °C 34 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
9 Apr after 35.0 °C 42 % 42 km/h 1.2 mm High 24
10 Apr after 34.0 °C 42 % 44 km/h 0.4 mm High 28
11 Apr after 34.3 °C 40 % 44 km/h 0.2 mm High 28
12 Apr after 33.8 °C 40 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Apr after 34.8 °C 39 % 48 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
14 Apr after 32.9 °C 48 % 47 km/h 2.2 mm Moderate 15

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 26 Mar 2018
After · 13 Apr 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 · 299Every 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 Venezuela ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Uracoa fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 April 2018 and 6 April 2018: 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 5,944 hectares (59.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Libertador (4,246 ha, 1.3 %); Uracoa (1,734 ha, 0.9 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.4 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 36, class 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

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 (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.