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Aigialeia fire, July 2023 Αιγιαλείας · Aigialeia

Out · last detection 25 Jul 2023, 00:51 UTC

The fire started on 23 July 2023 in Aigialeia, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,657 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 4th largest in Western Greece since 2016 (of 36 with a page). Number 12 in Greece in 2023, of 34.

The power measured by the satellite is low (11.4 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
1,657ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
5days
23 Jul 2023 – 27 Jul 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Jul
2023
Heat detections
57
in a single hotspot: 11 MW
Danger at start
87
Very extreme · FWI index
Energy released
258MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

25 Jul 2023
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 23 Jul27 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

232425

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

42°high
56km/h · peak gust
13%lowest humidity

It had gone 27 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Aigialeia Αιγιαλείας where it started
    1,660 ha reached on 23 Jul
    2.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official 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.

What burned

  • Scrub and transitional woodland89 %
  • Agricultural areas6.6 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub3.1 %
  • Other natural land1.6 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 48 %

Natura 2000 sites (European Environment Agency, 2024 release) crossed by the perimeter.

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

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)
23 Jul 42.1 °C 13 % 56 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 87
24 Jul 38.5 °C 23 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
25 Jul 41.2 °C 18 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Jul 41.6 °C 18 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 67
27 Jul 36.1 °C 19 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
28 Jul after 33.2 °C 35 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
29 Jul after 33.8 °C 29 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Jul after 34.5 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
31 Jul after 35.7 °C 25 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
1 Aug after 33.5 °C 36 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
2 Aug after 35.2 °C 29 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
3 Aug after 35.4 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Aug after 35.9 °C 29 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
5 Aug after 34.2 °C 47 % 53 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 47
6 Aug after 31.0 °C 29 % 45 km/h 0.5 mm Very high 44

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 16 Jul 2023
After · 3 Aug 2023

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 24 July 2023 the air beside the fire reached 23 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 18: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak23 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM1062 µg/m³
Optical depth0.56
21222324252627282930
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 57Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Greece ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Aigialeia fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 23 July 2023 and 27 July 2023: 5 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,657 hectares (16.6 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Aigialeia (1,660 ha, 2.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 42.1 °C, humidity dropped to 13 % and gusts hit 56 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 87, class Very extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Greece (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: 112 · 199

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
What do you think is wrong?

We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 112 · 199.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. 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 ADM3 (CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.