Carlentini fire, July 2018 Melilli, Carlentini
The fire started on 23 July 2018 in Carlentini, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 413 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 13th largest in Siracusa since 2016 (of 57 with a page). Number 6 in Italy in 2018, of 29.
- Burnt area
- 413ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 23 Jul 2018 – 23 Jul 2018
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 23 Jul
- 2018
- Heat detections
- 1
- in a single hotspot: 63 MW
- Danger at start
- 61
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 63MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 27 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 1 Aug.
This area had burned before
36% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 148 ha in 2017.
What happened to each town
-
Melilli 34,658 inhabitants · 16.9 km from the town215 ha1.6 %
-
198 ha reached on 23 Jul1.3 %
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 land50 %
- Agricultural areas31 %
- Broadleaved forest19 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Jul | 37.7 °C | 20 % | 67 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 24 Jul after | 31.0 °C | 34 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 25 Jul after | 31.8 °C | 27 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 26 Jul after | 31.5 °C | 26 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 27 Jul after | 31.5 °C | 36 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 28 Jul after | 32.9 °C | 24 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 29 Jul after | 33.1 °C | 34 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 30 Jul after | 32.7 °C | 35 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 31 Jul after | 32.4 °C | 41 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 1 Aug after | 33.4 °C | 40 % | 30 km/h | 1.7 mm | Moderate 17 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
Detections table · 1Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Carlentini fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 23 July 2018 and 23 July 2018: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 413 hectares (4.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Melilli (215 ha, 1.6 %); Carlentini (198 ha, 1.3 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.6 km of Carlentini. 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 37.7 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 67 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 61, 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
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.