Amazon Fires Torched Area Equal to 4.2 Million Soccer Fields in August

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The August fires in the Amazon burned 29,944 square kilometers of the biome, the equivalent to 4.2 million soccer fields, according to data from the National Institute for Space Research (INPE). The burnt territory is over four times larger than that recorded in August 2018, when 6,048 km² were burnt. In all, the Amazon is 5.5 million km², 4.19 million km² of which lie in nine Brazilian states.

The measured area is the largest since 2010, when the region suffered from an intense drought and 43,187 km² were burnt.

In addition to recording more fires, they were also larger this year. On average, each outbreak burned an area of 800 m². In 2018, this average was 580 m². In August this year, there were 30,901 outbreaks recorded by INPE.

The month of August accounted for 63 percent of the total area burnt in the biome in the year, which now totals 43,573 km² of area affected. Despite the fact that this is only the ninth month of the year, the total area burnt so far already exceeds the 43,171 km² destroyed by fires in 2018.

Historically, due to climate conditions, the month of September records the most fires. In the first two days of this month, INPE has already reported 1,514 outbreaks in the Amazon, 56 percent of the total recorded in the first two days of the month last year.

According to experts consulted by UOL, 2019 is drier, but far from the levels recorded in 2010, when there was a record number of fires in the biome in the decade.

Ane Alencar, director of science at the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), explains that the increase in the number of fires can only be explained by the increase in deforestation, since there was no extreme climate event that justifies this situation.

“This year there is no extreme drought, as there was in 2015 and 2016. In 2017 and 2018, we had a sufficiently rainy period. In 2019, there are no climate events that affect droughts, like El Niño, or they are not happening strongly. The climate is no explanation for this increase [in forest fires],” she says.

On Saturday, August 31st, UOL reported that the fire scars perceived by INPE through satellite images in the last 12 months, totaled 5,671 km² and were equivalent to 32 percent of the total deforestation or degradation of the Amazonian soil.

Burnt area in August per year (in km²):
2010 – 43,187
2011 – 6,630
2012 – 15,856
2013 – 6,271
2014 – 15,773
2015 – 15,365
2016 – 15,462
2017 – 17,630
2018 – 6,048
2019 – 29,944

Source: INPE