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Cáceres fire, July 2021 Cáceres, Malpartida de Cáceres

Out · last detection 13 Jul 2021, 02:44 UTC

The fire started on 12 July 2021 in Cáceres, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 185 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), the largest of the 2 recorded fires was detected on 11 July 2021 at 19:05 and declared extinguished on 12 July 2021.

It is the 49th largest in Cáceres since 2016 (of 70 with a page). Number 72 in Spain in 2021, of 120.

The power measured by the satellite is low (5.6 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
185ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
12 Jul 2021 – 13 Jul 2021
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
12 Jul
2021
Heat detections
3
in a single hotspot: 6 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
9MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

13 Jul 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 12 Jul13 Jul

How it evolved, day by day

1213

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

The weather it burned in

30°high
46km/h · peak gust
18%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 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. Cáceres 4,511 inhabitants · 13.4 km from the town where it started
    174 ha reached on 12 Jul
    0.1 %
  2. Malpartida de Cáceres 4,027 inhabitants · 3.4 km from the town
    12 ha reached on 13 Jul
    0.4 %

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 land84 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub12 %
  • Artificial surfaces3.8 %

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

Official record

According to EGIF (MITECO), 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 176 ha (the satellite measured 185 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.

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)
12 Jul 26.9 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
13 Jul 30.1 °C 18 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Jul after 33.1 °C 18 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
15 Jul after 35.5 °C 16 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
16 Jul after 38.0 °C 18 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
17 Jul after 38.6 °C 19 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
18 Jul after 37.9 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Jul after 35.8 °C 23 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
20 Jul after 33.5 °C 22 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
21 Jul after 36.0 °C 17 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
22 Jul after 36.8 °C 12 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
23 Jul after 30.3 °C 24 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 5 Jul 2021
After · 20 Jul 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 11 July 2021 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
PM1060 µg/m³
10111213141516
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 · 3Every 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 Cáceres fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 12 July 2021 and 13 July 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), the largest of the 2 recorded fires was detected on 11 July 2021 at 19:05 and declared extinguished on 12 July 2021.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 185 hectares (1.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cáceres (174 ha, 0.1 %); Malpartida de Cáceres (12 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.4 km of Malpartida de Cáceres. 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 30.1 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 46 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very high.
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
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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.