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Ancede e Ribadouro fire, September 2024 Ancede e Ribadouro, Gove, Grilo

Out · last detection 18 Sept 2024, 14:00 UTC

The fire started on 16 September 2024 in Ancede e Ribadouro, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 2,079 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 6 municipalities.

It is the 2th largest in Baião since 2016 (of 14 with a page). Number 12 in Portugal in 2024, of 69.

Burnt area
2,079ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
3days
16 Sept 2024 – 18 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
6
freguesias
Started on
16 Sept
2024
Heat detections
164
in a single hotspot: 131 MW
Danger at start
66
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
2.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

18 Sept 2024
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Sept18 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

161718

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
68km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 19 Sept.

This area had burned before

42% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 185 ha in 2016, 301 ha in 2018, 31 ha in 2019, 4 ha in 2020, 389 ha in 2022, 22 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 872 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Ancede e Ribadouro 2,335 inhabitants · 0.0 km from the town where it started
    868 ha reached on 16 Sept
    59 %
  2. Gove 1,742 inhabitants · 0.2 km from the town
    621 ha reached on 16 Sept
    55 %
  3. Grilo 472 inhabitants · 0.4 km from the town
    217 ha reached on 16 Sept
    37 %
  4. Baião (Santa Leocádia) e Mesquinhata 731 inhabitants · 0.3 km from the town
    183 ha reached on 16 Sept
    21 %
  5. Santa Cruz do Douro e São Tomé de Covelas 1,654 inhabitants · 1.6 km from the town
    175 ha reached on 16 Sept
    11 %
  6. União das Freguesias de Campelo e Ovil e Loivos do Monte 3,686 inhabitants · 3.0 km from the town
    17 ha reached on 17 Sept
    0.5 %

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 woodland33 %
  • Agricultural areas29 %
  • Other natural land17 %
  • Mixed forest16 %
  • Broadleaved forest4.0 %
  • Artificial surfaces2.0 %

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

Official record

According to ICNF, 3 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 2,737 ha (the satellite measured 2,079 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

ICNF (Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas). This is the agency’s operational record: its figures may be revised when the year’s statistics are closed.

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)
16 Sept 30.9 °C 12 % 68 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
17 Sept 26.3 °C 22 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
18 Sept 28.0 °C 26 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Sept after 24.9 °C 46 % 33 km/h 1.0 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Sept 2024
After · 25 Sept 2024

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 19 September 2024 the air beside the fire reached 327 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 207: 14 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak327 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM10377 µg/m³
Optical depth4.89
1415161718192021
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 · 164Every 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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ancede e Ribadouro fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 16 September 2024 and 18 September 2024: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 2,079 hectares (20.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 6 municipalities: Ancede e Ribadouro (868 ha, 59 %); Gove (621 ha, 55 %); Grilo (217 ha, 37 %); Baião (Santa Leocádia) e Mesquinhata (183 ha, 21 %); Santa Cruz do Douro e São Tomé de Covelas (175 ha, 11 %); União das Freguesias de Campelo e Ovil e Loivos do Monte (17 ha, 0.5 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 0.0 km of Ancede e Ribadouro. 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 30.9 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 68 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 66, class Extreme.
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.