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Vertientes fire, March 2023 Vertientes, Santa Cruz del Sur

Out · last detection 17 Mar 2023, 06:39 UTC

The fire started on 9 March 2023 in Vertientes, Cuba, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,935 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 13th largest in Camagüey since 2016 (of 63 with a page). Number 7 in Cuba in 2023, of 46.

Burnt area
1,935ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
9 Mar 2023 – 17 Mar 2023
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
9 Mar
2023
Heat detections
74
in a single hotspot: 38 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
617MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Mar 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Mar17 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

1011121314151617

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
50km/h · peak gust
34%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.7 mm on 18 Mar.

This area had burned before

82% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,584 ha in 2021.

What happened to each town

  1. Vertientes where it started
    1,570 ha reached on 10 Mar
    0.8 %
  2. Santa Cruz del Sur
    372 ha reached on 13 Mar
    0.3 %

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)
9 Mar 30.6 °C 45 % 40 km/h 0.1 mm High 33
10 Mar 29.9 °C 38 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
11 Mar 29.5 °C 51 % 28 km/h 0.1 mm High 24
12 Mar 29.9 °C 51 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
13 Mar 30.7 °C 47 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
14 Mar 31.5 °C 46 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
15 Mar 30.8 °C 48 % 29 km/h 2.6 mm Moderate 12
16 Mar 31.6 °C 34 % 50 km/h 0.4 mm High 33
17 Mar 30.3 °C 41 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
18 Mar after 28.9 °C 63 % 37 km/h 4.7 mm Low 5

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Mar 2023
After · 24 Mar 2023

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 · Copernicus

On 13 March 2023 the air beside the fire reached 28 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak28 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1042 µg/m³
Optical depth0.50
7891011121314151617181920
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

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 · 74Every 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 Cuba ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Vertientes fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 9 March 2023 and 17 March 2023: 9 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 1,935 hectares (19.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Vertientes (1,570 ha, 0.8 %); Santa Cruz del Sur (372 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 34 % and gusts hit 50 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 Cuba (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: 105

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 105.

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.