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Castelo Branco fire, August 2020 União das Freguesias de Escalos de Baixo e Mata, Ladoeiro

Out · last detection 30 Aug 2020, 01:47 UTC

The fire started on 29 August 2020 in União das Freguesias de Escalos de Baixo e Mata, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 324 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 29 August 2020 at 17:26 and declared extinguished on 30 August 2020.

Number 32 in Portugal in 2020, of 67.

The power measured by the satellite is low (1.3 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
324ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
29 Aug 2020 – 30 Aug 2020
Municipalities hit
2
freguesias
Started on
29 Aug
2020
Heat detections
1
in a single hotspot: 1 MW
Danger at start
46
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
1MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 29 Aug30 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

30

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

The weather it burned in

28°high
39km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 38 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. União das Freguesias de Escalos de Baixo e Mata 470 inhabitants · 3.4 km from the town where it started
    297 ha reached on 30 Aug
    4.2 %
  2. Ladoeiro 1,053 inhabitants · 7.2 km from the town
    28 ha
    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

  • Sclerophyllous scrub41 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland33 %
  • Broadleaved forest22 %
  • Agricultural areas3.7 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 58 %

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 ICNF, this fire started on 29 August 2020 and burned 319 ha (the satellite measured 324 ha).

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)
29 Aug 27.3 °C 22 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
30 Aug 27.9 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
31 Aug after 30.8 °C 12 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
1 Sept after 32.0 °C 18 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
2 Sept after 33.3 °C 13 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
3 Sept after 35.8 °C 9 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
4 Sept after 35.8 °C 13 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
5 Sept after 36.0 °C 15 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
6 Sept after 36.2 °C 16 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 50
7 Sept after 33.7 °C 16 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
8 Sept after 31.3 °C 16 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
9 Sept after 32.8 °C 16 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 22 Aug 2020
After · 6 Sept 2020

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 September 2020 the air beside the fire reached 10 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak10 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1016 µg/m³
272829303112
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 · 1Every 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 Castelo Branco fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 29 August 2020 and 30 August 2020: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 29 August 2020 at 17:26 and declared extinguished on 30 August 2020.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 324 hectares (3.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: União das Freguesias de Escalos de Baixo e Mata (297 ha, 4.2 %); Ladoeiro (28 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.4 km of União das Freguesias de Escalos de Baixo e Mata. 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 27.9 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very high.
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.