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Alvadia fire, April 2017 Alvadia

Out · last measured on 12 Apr 2017

The fire started on 11 April 2017 in Alvadia, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 126 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

This entry is most likely a pasture burn or a prescribed winter burn in northern Portugal, not a wildfire. In these hills scrub is burnt to renew grazing, and this fire is not in the ICNF register of rural fires. This is our assumption, based on the time of year and the lack of an official record; it is not confirmed. That is why it is left out of the wildfire rankings.

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
126ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
11 Apr 2017 – 12 Apr 2017
Municipalities hit
1
freguesias
Started on
11 Apr
2017
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Natura 2000
100%
of the perimeter is protected land

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

21°high
31km/h · peak gust
30%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.6 mm on 18 Apr.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Alvadia 165 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town where it started
    126 ha reached on 17 Apr
    3.7 %

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

  • Other natural land100 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

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)
11 Apr 20.9 °C 33 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
12 Apr 19.2 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 11
13 Apr after 17.8 °C 35 % 36 km/h 0.2 mm Moderate 11
14 Apr after 15.4 °C 44 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
15 Apr after 16.2 °C 45 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
16 Apr after 17.9 °C 33 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
17 Apr after 18.5 °C 37 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
18 Apr after 13.3 °C 50 % 28 km/h 2.6 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 4 Apr 2017
After · 19 Apr 2017

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 13 April 2017 the air beside the fire reached 26 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 15: 1.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak26 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1037 µg/m³
9101112131415
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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Alvadia fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 11 April 2017 and 12 April 2017: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 126 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Alvadia (126 ha, 3.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Alvadia. 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 20.9 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 11, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Portugal (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

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.

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.