Patagual
General information
- Category
- Wildfire
- Fire classification
- Convective plume
- Country
- Chile
- Year
- 2025
The Patagual fire starts in a cropfield an spreads quickly throught this grass-fuel type, at velocities up to 3km/h. The rapid spread of the fire, coupled with the presence of urbanised areas within the affected perimeter, complicated the process of extinguishing it. Concurrently with this fire, just over 5 km to the south, a fire that had occurred a few days earlier (Vega Honda) reignited, causing the two columns of smoke to merge and, due to the synoptic situation, preventing them from growing vertically. This was the primary cause of the rapid spread of both fires.
Fire behaviour and surface observations
| Start location lat | -36.683683 deg N |
| Start location lon | -71.949610 deg E |
| Start location name | Patagual |
| Start hour | 08/02/2025 20:50:00 (UTC) |
| Surface affected | 218 ha |
| Fire behavior | Surface, mid intenisty |
| Torching head | 5 % |
| Torching flanks | % |
| Flame length mean head | 2 m |
| Flame length max head | 5 m |
| Flame length mean flanks | m |
| Flame length max flanks | m |
| Spotting mean | m |
| Spotting max | 200 m |
| Rate of spread mean | 2400 m/h |
| Rate of spread max | 3000 m/h |
| Burn ratio mean | 100 ha/h |
| Burn ratio max | 230 ha/h |
