Vera fire, 21 April 2025 Vera
The fire started on 21 April 2025 in Vera, Argentina, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,895 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 151th largest in Santa Fe since 2016 (of 252 with a page). Number 135 in Argentina in 2025, of 206.
The power measured by the satellite is low (29.2 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
- Burnt area
- 1,895ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 3days
- 21 Apr 2025 – 23 Apr 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- departments
- Started on
- 21 Apr
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 82
- in a single hotspot: 29 MW
- Danger at start
- 13
- Moderate · FWI index
- Energy released
- 554MW
- 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 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
93% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 426 ha in 2018, 1,681 ha in 2020, 399 ha in 2021, 862 ha in 2022, 323 ha in 2023, 40 ha in 2024. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,766 ha that had burned before.
- 459 ha Vera fire, August 2020 1,978 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 272 ha Vera fire, April 2020 1,799 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 203 ha Vera fire, May 2020 8,521 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 191 ha Vera fire, March 2018 8,648 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 94 ha Vera fire, February 2020 7,210 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 60 ha Vera fire, December 2021 20,819 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Vera where it started1,894 ha reached on 20 Apr0.1 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21 Apr | 23.7 °C | 41 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 22 Apr | 27.2 °C | 35 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 23 Apr | 30.2 °C | 44 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 24 Apr after | 27.1 °C | 59 % | 34 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 25 Apr after | 27.8 °C | 55 % | 32 km/h | 0.1 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 26 Apr after | 28.0 °C | 52 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 27 Apr after | 22.1 °C | 46 % | 40 km/h | 0.9 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 28 Apr after | 26.0 °C | 32 % | 16 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 29 Apr after | 26.3 °C | 29 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 30 Apr after | 27.3 °C | 29 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 1 May after | 29.6 °C | 30 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 2 May after | 22.5 °C | 59 % | 20 km/h | 0.4 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 3 May after | 28.2 °C | 49 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
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 24 April 2025 the air beside the fire reached 18 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO 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 · 82Every 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 Vera fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 21 April 2025 and 23 April 2025: 3 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 1,895 hectares (19.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Vera (1,894 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 30.2 °C, humidity dropped to 35 % and gusts hit 24 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 16, class Moderate.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Argentina (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 · 100
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.