Brazil's federal government announced on Saturday (17) the deployment of five additional aircraft to reinforce firefighting operations in Amazonas state, raising the total number of planes and helicopters in action there from 11 to 16. The announcement came on the same day Manaus, the state capital, once again posted the worst air quality index among Brazilian capitals, according to the international monitoring platform IQAir: 657 points at 8:40 a.m., a level classified as hazardous.
Among the new aircraft is a second KC-390, a military transport plane able to drop up to 19,000 liters of water per run. It joins another KC-390 already in operation, with a 12,000-liter capacity, plus helicopters assigned to water drops, crew transport and logistics in hard-to-reach areas. According to the federal government, since support operations began on October 9, about 600,000 liters of water have been dropped over the state in 260 flight hours. Ibama, the federal environmental agency, counts 317 fires extinguished since the start of the season.
Monitoring figures help size up the crisis. After a peak of 494 new fire hotspots on October 10, Amazonas had 188 active fires as of Friday (16), according to the Queimadas dashboard run by the National Institute for Space Research (Inpe). The task force in the state includes 330 firefighters coordinated by Ibama and ICMBio, the federal conservation agency, supported by 32 land vehicles and eight boats, according to the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change.
Money, police and health
The package includes about R$ 14 million (roughly US$ 2.6 million) committed by the National Civil Defense for emergency actions, including logistics, protective equipment and the hiring of two additional aircraft. On Friday (16), a decree published in the official gazette authorized a single transfer of R$ 14.3 million to Amazonas, with a 180-day deadline for execution. The document, however, does not detail the actions or state expressly whether the funds will go to fighting the wildfires.
Federal Police, Federal Highway Police and Armed Forces personnel will also be mobilized, with troop numbers still to be defined. The highway police are expected to patrol secondary roads and support Ibama operations, and the government promised to step up investigations into deliberately set fires. Environment Minister João Paulo Capobianco told Agência Brasil that the fires result from intentional human action and that federal, highway and state civil police are already investigating their origin. Ane Alencar, science director at the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (Ipam), sees signs of land grabbing in satellite images: the hotspots are concentrated in 19 municipalities near Manaus, in forested areas on public land not yet designated for any social or environmental use.
On the health front, the Health Ministry will set up a decentralized base of the National Force of the SUS, Brazil's public health system, in Manaus, scheduled for Tuesday (20). It will be the fourth such base opened in the country this year, under federal planning for the impacts of the 2026/2027 El Niño. So far, according to the government, the smoke has not overloaded the health system. Even so, the Amazonas Civil Defense issued a severe-risk alert and recommended mask use, and the Manaus city government told residents to keep doors and windows shut and avoid outdoor exercise.
The climate context adds pressure to the response. El Niño, the warming of tropical Pacific waters that makes rainfall irregular, is expected to intensify its effects on the central-northern Amazon in the coming months, according to Alencar. On Sunday (18), ministers Capobianco (Environment), Wellington César Lima e Silva (Justice), José Múcio Monteiro (Defense) and Waldez Góes (Regional Integration) arrive in Manaus to monitor the fires and coordinate the expansion of federal actions with the state government.