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Buscemi fire, July 2021 Buscemi, Cassaro

Out · last detection 1 Aug 2021, 01:47 UTC

The fire started on 30 July 2021 in Buscemi, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 570 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 9th largest in Siracusa since 2016 (of 57 with a page). Number 44 in Italy in 2021, of 291.

Burnt area
570ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
4days
30 Jul 2021 – 2 Aug 2021
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
30 Jul
2021
Heat detections
33
in a single hotspot: 52 MW
Danger at start
56
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
498MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

1 Aug 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 30 Jul2 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

311

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

The weather it burned in

36°high
50km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 29 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Buscemi 950 inhabitants · 1.5 km from the town where it started
    448 ha reached on 31 Jul
    8.7 %
  2. Cassaro 724 inhabitants · 1.4 km from the town
    123 ha reached on 31 Jul
    6.3 %

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 land74 %
  • Agricultural areas24 %
  • Broadleaved forest1.9 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 40 %

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)
30 Jul 36.1 °C 17 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
31 Jul 33.1 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
1 Aug 34.7 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
2 Aug 34.8 °C 25 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
3 Aug after 33.1 °C 29 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
4 Aug after 36.2 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
5 Aug after 35.0 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
6 Aug after 32.1 °C 27 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Aug after 29.1 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
8 Aug after 29.7 °C 39 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
9 Aug after 34.3 °C 22 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
10 Aug after 38.3 °C 13 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
11 Aug after 40.7 °C 15 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
12 Aug after 32.4 °C 34 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Jul 2021
After · 9 Aug 2021

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 1 August 2021 the air beside the fire reached 33 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 26: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak33 µg/m³
Days over the guideline9 days
PM1066 µg/m³
2829303112345
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 · 33Every 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 Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Buscemi fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 30 July 2021 and 2 August 2021: 4 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 570 hectares (5.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Buscemi (448 ha, 8.7 %); Cassaro (123 ha, 6.3 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.4 km of Cassaro. 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 36.1 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, class Extreme.
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.