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Alimena fire, July 2016 Alimena, Petralia Sottana, Resuttano

Out · last measured on 7 Jul 2016

The fire started on 7 July 2016 in Alimena, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 800 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 4 municipalities.

It is the 29th largest in Palermo since 2016 (of 178 with a page). Number 6 in Italy in 2016, of 78.

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
800ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
7 Jul 2016 – 7 Jul 2016
Municipalities hit
4
municipalities
Started on
7 Jul
2016
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

32°high
37km/h · peak gust
35%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.3 mm on 10 Jul.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Alimena 1,761 inhabitants · 3.1 km from the town where it started
    521 ha
    8.8 %
  2. Petralia Sottana
    141 ha
    0.8 %
  3. Resuttano 1,752 inhabitants · 2.7 km from the town
    120 ha
    3.1 %
  4. Bompietro 876 inhabitants · 6.8 km from the town
    19 ha
    0.4 %

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

  • Agricultural areas69 %
  • Other natural land31 %

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)
7 Jul 32.1 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
8 Jul after 33.5 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
9 Jul after 33.9 °C 22 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
10 Jul after 34.5 °C 24 % 25 km/h 1.3 mm Moderate 21

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Jun 2016
After · 14 Jul 2016

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 10 July 2016 the air beside the fire reached 38 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak38 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM1046 µg/m³
5678910
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Alimena fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 7 July 2016 and 7 July 2016: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 800 hectares (8.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 4 municipalities: Alimena (521 ha, 8.8 %); Petralia Sottana (141 ha, 0.8 %); Resuttano (120 ha, 3.1 %); Bompietro (19 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.7 km of Resuttano. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 32.1 °C, humidity dropped to 35 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 24, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Italy (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 · 1515

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 · 1515.

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 ADM4 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License). 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.