Skip to content
worldfires
PT · Portugal · →

Bucos fire, September 2024 Cabeceiras de Basto, Bucos

Out · last detection 20 Sept 2024, 01:59 UTC

The fire started on 20 September 2024 in Bucos, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 132 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 17th largest in Cabeceiras de Basto since 2016 (of 24 with a page). Number 62 in Portugal in 2024, of 69.

The power measured by the satellite is low (1.6 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
132ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
20 Sept 2024 – 20 Sept 2024
Municipalities hit
2
freguesias
Started on
20 Sept
2024
Heat detections
4
in a single hotspot: 2 MW
Danger at start
0
Very low · FWI index
Energy released
6MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Sept20 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

20

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

The weather it burned in

18°high
24km/h · peak gust
72%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 21 Sept.

This area had burned before

52% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 28 ha in 2017, 35 ha in 2018, 3 ha in 2019, 12 ha in 2021, 5 ha in 2022, 2 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 69 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Cabeceiras de Basto 616 inhabitants · 1.0 km from the town
    74 ha reached on 20 Sept
    3.0 %
  2. Bucos 469 inhabitants · 2.1 km from the town where it started
    58 ha reached on 20 Sept
    3.3 %

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 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland35 %

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

Official record

According to ICNF, 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 224 ha (the satellite measured 132 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)
20 Sept 18.5 °C 72 % 24 km/h 9.2 mm Very low 0
21 Sept after 18.4 °C 65 % 34 km/h 1.4 mm Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 13 Sept 2024
After · 27 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 224 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 78: 5.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak224 µg/m³
Days over the guideline5 days
PM10266 µg/m³
Optical depth3.49
181920212223
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 · 4Every 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 Bucos fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 20 September 2024 and 20 September 2024: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 132 hectares (1.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cabeceiras de Basto (74 ha, 3.0 %); Bucos (58 ha, 3.3 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.0 km of Cabeceiras de Basto. 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 18.5 °C, humidity dropped to 72 % and gusts hit 24 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 0, class Very low.
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.