Villeta fire, 14 February 2022 Villeta, Nueva Italia, Villa Oliva
The fire started on 14 February 2022 in Villeta, Paraguay, and satellites saw it burning for 7 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,978 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 3th largest in CENTRAL since 2016 (of 21 with a page). Number 23 in Paraguay in 2022, of 185.
- Burnt area
- 4,978ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 7days
- 14 Feb 2022 – 20 Feb 2022
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 14 Feb
- 2022
- Heat detections
- 265
- in a single hotspot: 73 MW
- Danger at start
- 20
- Moderate · FWI index
- Energy released
- 2.8GW
- 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 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 10.6 mm on 21 Feb.
This area had burned before
80% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 224 ha in 2016, 1,470 ha in 2018, 436 ha in 2019, 8,498 ha in 2020, 1 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,959 ha that had burned before.
- 2,766 ha Villeta fire, August 2020 22,209 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,627 ha Villeta fire, March 2020 13,543 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 998 ha Villeta fire, August 2018 2,093 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 7 ha Villeta fire, August 2020 3,713 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Villeta where it started4,872 ha reached on 14 Feb5.6 %
-
128 ha reached on 18 Feb0.3 %
-
5 ha0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14 Feb | 34.2 °C | 31 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 15 Feb | 37.4 °C | 24 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 16 Feb | 38.9 °C | 23 % | 19 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 17 Feb | 35.1 °C | 33 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 18 Feb | 37.5 °C | 26 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 19 Feb | 37.9 °C | 25 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 20 Feb | 33.7 °C | 45 % | 41 km/h | 2.6 mm | Low 11 |
| 21 Feb after | 29.9 °C | 60 % | 30 km/h | 10.6 mm | Very low 2 |
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.
Detections table · 265Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 13,543 haVilletaMarch 2020 · 8 days · 7 km away
- 22,209 haVilleta20 August 2020 · 13 days · 9 km away
- 58,707 haVilla OlivaDecember 2021 · 44 days · 19 km away
- 21,230 haVilla OlivaJuly 2020 · 14 days · 22 km away
- 16,508 haVilla OlivaFebruary 2022 · 29 days · 26 km away
- 13,060 haVilla OlivaFebruary 2020 · 19 days · 26 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Villeta fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 14 February 2022 and 20 February 2022: 7 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 4,978 hectares (49.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Villeta (4,872 ha, 5.6 %); Nueva Italia (128 ha, 0.3 %); Villa Oliva (5 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 38.9 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class High.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Paraguay (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: 132 · 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
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.