Alexandroupolis fire, 30 August 2020 Αλεξανδρούπολη · Alexandroupolis
The fire started on 30 August 2020 in Alexandroupolis, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 245 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 18th largest in Eastern Macedonia and Thrace since 2016 (of 27 with a page). Number 9 in Greece in 2020, of 22.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 245ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 30 Aug 2020 – 30 Aug 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 30 Aug
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 4
- in a single hotspot: 47 MW
- Danger at start
- 39
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 162MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
30 Aug 2020 · 162 MW · 4
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 9 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
-
245 ha reached on 30 Aug0.2 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
What burned
- Agricultural areas54 %
- Sclerophyllous scrub46 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %
- ZEPA NOTIO DASIKO SYMPLEGMA EVROU GR1110009
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30 Aug | 36.8 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 31 Aug after | 36.7 °C | 28 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 1 Sept after | 34.7 °C | 30 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 2 Sept after | 35.3 °C | 27 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 3 Sept after | 34.4 °C | 34 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 4 Sept after | 29.8 °C | 29 % | 56 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 5 Sept after | 31.2 °C | 27 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 6 Sept after | 32.9 °C | 21 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 38 |
| 7 Sept after | 33.9 °C | 32 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 8 Sept after | 35.1 °C | 26 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 9 Sept after | 32.7 °C | 35 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · CopernicusOn 28 August 2020 the air beside the fire reached 19 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
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 · 4Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 848 haAlexandroupolis Αλεξανδρούπολη15 September 2020 · 3 days · 10 km away
- 96,610 haAlexandroupolis ΑλεξανδρούποληAugust 2023 · 24 days · 21 km away
- 625 haSoufliou ΣουφλίουOctober 2020 · 2 days · 22 km away
- 254 haSoufliou ΣουφλίουJuly 2021 · 2 days · 23 km away
- 4,604 haSoufliou ΣουφλίουJuly 2022 · 6 days · 29 km away
- 1,198 haEnezAugust 2025 · 2 days · 30 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Alexandroupolis fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 30 August 2020 and 30 August 2020: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 245 hectares (2.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Alexandroupolis (245 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 36.8 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 34 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
- 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 4 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
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.