Wildfire near Bacalar (Aug 8)
True color
Fire (SWIR)
Infrared / SWIR (right): sees through smoke.
🟢 green = vegetation
🟤 red/brown = burned
🟠 orange = active fire
Imagery: Sentinel-2 (Copernicus). Drag to compare smoke vs. infrared.
Heat detections: NASA FIRMS (last 48h).
Burning near Bacalar in Mexico, a 100-hectare (247-acre) wildfire progressed at an average daily growth of approximately 50 hectares per day over a two-day span after starting on August 8, 2026. Satellites picked up a moderate heat signature from the front, with one NASA FIRMS heat detection registered within 48 hours as the fire advanced through the region.
The incident occurred outside the typical fire season for the area, which generally runs from March to June. By the time the fire had ended, the broader national landscape showed that 1,277,957 hectares had burned so far in 2026, marking a figure 70% below the two-decade average for the country.
In context
This wildfire burned in Mexico for 2 days. In total it burned about 100 ha (247 acres) — around 1.0 km².
Close to the tropics, fires tend to follow the dry season and are often linked to land-clearing rather than a single summer peak.
The bigger picture in Mexico
Across Mexico, roughly 1,313,383 hectares have burned so far in 2026 — 70% below the two-decade average. Data from Copernicus GWIS.
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