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Bolbaite fire, June 2016 Chella, Sellent, Sumacàrcer

Out · last detection 17 Jun 2016, 03:09 UTC

The fire started on 15 June 2016 in Chella, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,496 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 5 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 15 June 2016 at 19:40 and declared extinguished on 21 June 2016.

Number 12 in Spain in 2016, of 69.

Burnt area
1,496ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
15 Jun 2016 – 16 Jun 2016
Municipalities hit
5
municipalities
Started on
15 Jun
2016
Heat detections
110
in a single hotspot: 45 MW
Danger at start
59
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
838MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

17 Jun 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 15 Jun16 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

1617

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
60km/h · peak gust
14%lowest humidity

It had gone 17 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 5.1 mm on 18 Jun.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Chella where it started
    639 ha reached on 16 Jun
    15 %
  2. Sellent 383 inhabitants · 1.2 km from the town
    314 ha reached on 16 Jun
    22 %
  3. Sumacàrcer 1,013 inhabitants · 2.0 km from the town
    231 ha reached on 16 Jun
    11 %
  4. Cotes 314 inhabitants · 2.9 km from the town
    205 ha reached on 16 Jun
    32 %
  5. Anna 2,600 inhabitants · 1.5 km from the town
    109 ha reached on 16 Jun
    5.1 %

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 land65 %
  • Coniferous forest12 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub9.4 %
  • Agricultural areas9.1 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland4.0 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 1 %

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.

Official record

According to EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 15 June 2016 and burned 1,564 ha (the satellite measured 1,496 ha).

MITECO, Estadística General de Incendios Forestales (EGIF). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

Checked against the press

Checked on 30 September 2026

We checked this page against 3 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:

Also known as
incendio de Bolbaite-Chella · incendio de la Canal de Navarrés · incendio de Sumacàrcer
Official area reported: 1,500 ha (the satellite measured 1,496 ha)
Declared under control (not yet extinguished): 18 June 2016

Sources

Official figures are measured differently from satellite ones and sometimes cover only part of the fire.

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)
15 Jun 32.4 °C 15 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
16 Jun 27.0 °C 17 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
17 Jun after 28.9 °C 14 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
18 Jun after 22.6 °C 48 % 38 km/h 5.1 mm Very low 5

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 8 Jun 2016
After · 23 Jun 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 13 June 2016 the air beside the fire reached 24 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak24 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1044 µg/m³
1314151617181920
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 · 110Every 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 Spain ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bolbaite fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 15 June 2016 and 16 June 2016: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 15 June 2016 at 19:40 and declared extinguished on 21 June 2016.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,496 hectares (15.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: Chella (639 ha, 15 %); Sellent (314 ha, 22 %); Sumacàrcer (231 ha, 11 %); Cotes (205 ha, 32 %); Anna (109 ha, 5.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.2 km of Sellent. 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 32.4 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 60 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 59, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Spain (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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.