How long did the Castro Daire fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 8 September 2019 and 8 September 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 8 September 2019 at 03:48 and declared extinguished on 8 September 2019.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 398 hectares (4.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Castro Daire (228 ha, 7.0 %); São Joaninho (136 ha, 17 %); Monteiras (35 ha, 1.6 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The fire came within 0.6 km of the centre of São Joaninho, the closest of the areas it touched. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 24.8 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 25, class 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.

PT · Portugal · 2019-09-08 → 2019-09-08

Castro Daire fire, 8 September 2019 Castro Daire, São Joaninho, Monteiras

Out · last detection 8 Sept 2019, 13:04 UTC

The fire started on 8 September 2019 in Castro Daire, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 398 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 8 September 2019 at 03:48 and declared extinguished on 8 September 2019.

It is the 10th largest in Castro Daire since 2016 (of 16 with a page). Number 14 in Portugal in 2019, of 52.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Castro Daire · 2024 Trancoso · 2025 Vouzela · 2017 Penalva do Castelo · 2024

Burnt area: 398ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 1day; 8 Sept 2019 – 8 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit: 3; freguesias
Started on: 8 Sept; 2019
Heat detections: 21; in a single hotspot: 57 MW
Danger at start: 25; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 697MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Sept8 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

8 Sept 2019 · 697 MW · 21

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

The weather it burned in

25°high

36km/h · peak gust

26%lowest humidity

It had gone 12 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 9.4 mm on 17 Sept.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

Castro Daire 4,557 inhabitants · 4.8 km from the centre where it started

228 ha reached on 8 Sept

7.0 %
São Joaninho 0.6 km from the centre

136 ha reached on 8 Sept

17 %
Monteiras 532 inhabitants · 4.1 km from the centre

35 ha reached on 8 Sept

1.6 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

Other natural land59 %
Agricultural areas24 %
Scrub and transitional woodland16 %
Coniferous forest1.5 %

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

People and buildings inside the perimeter

GHSL 2020

Built-up area< 0.1 ha

Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2020, satellite-based estimate).

This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.

Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu

Official record

According to ICNF, this fire started on 8 September 2019 and burned 358 ha (the satellite measured 398 ha).

Castro Daire Monteiras 8 September 2019 · 03:48 358 ha · extinguished on 8 September 2019 · cause: arson

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)
8 Sept	24.8 °C	26 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
9 Sept after	21.1 °C	39 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
10 Sept after	18.4 °C	35 %	49 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
11 Sept after	22.4 °C	31 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
12 Sept after	25.9 °C	28 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
13 Sept after	28.1 °C	22 %	52 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
14 Sept after	24.8 °C	35 %	45 km/h	0.1 mm	High 26
15 Sept after	22.8 °C	46 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 21
16 Sept after	19.6 °C	66 %	21 km/h	0.8 mm	Low 8
17 Sept after	22.3 °C	50 %	32 km/h	9.4 mm	Very low 1

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 1 Sept 2019

After · 15 Sept 2019

Before After

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 9 September 2019 the air beside the fire reached 16 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak16 µg/m³

Days over the guideline0 days

PM1019 µg/m³

WHO 15

67891011

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 · 21Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

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Frequently asked questions

How long did the Castro Daire fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 8 September 2019 and 8 September 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 8 September 2019 at 03:48 and declared extinguished on 8 September 2019.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 398 hectares (4.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Castro Daire (228 ha, 7.0 %); São Joaninho (136 ha, 17 %); Monteiras (35 ha, 1.6 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The fire came within 0.6 km of the centre of São Joaninho, the closest of the areas it touched. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 24.8 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 25, class 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

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How we know this

Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 21 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
Compared with ICNF: 358 official ha against 398 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2020, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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.

Where it burned