Skip to content
worldfires
PT · Portugal · →

Chaves fire, August 2017 Santo António de Monforte, Paradela, Lama de Arcos

Out · last detection 14 Aug 2017, 02:37 UTC

The fire started on 13 August 2017 in Santo António de Monforte, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 439 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 5 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 13 August 2017 at 16:22 and declared extinguished on 14 August 2017.

It is the 9th largest in Chaves since 2016 (of 13 with a page). Number 98 in Portugal in 2017, of 210.

The power measured by the satellite is low (2.2 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
439ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
13 Aug 2017 – 14 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
5
freguesias
Started on
13 Aug
2017
Heat detections
7
in a single hotspot: 2 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
12MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 13 Aug14 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

14

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
40km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 36 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. Santo António de Monforte 397 inhabitants · 0.8 km from the town where it started
    212 ha reached on 14 Aug
    18 %
  2. Paradela 1.2 km from the town
    133 ha reached on 14 Aug
    16 %
  3. Lama de Arcos 291 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town
    92 ha reached on 14 Aug
    6.8 %
  4. Águas Frias 607 inhabitants · 2.9 km from the town
    3 ha
    0.1 %
  5. Mairos 271 inhabitants · 2.8 km from the town
    0 ha
    0.0 %

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

  • Agricultural areas43 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland29 %
  • Other natural land15 %
  • Mixed forest13 %

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

Official record

According to ICNF, this fire started on 13 August 2017 and burned 439 ha (the satellite measured 439 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)
13 Aug 30.6 °C 20 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
14 Aug 31.1 °C 23 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
15 Aug after 27.1 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
16 Aug after 29.4 °C 30 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
17 Aug after 31.4 °C 24 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
18 Aug after 28.8 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
19 Aug after 30.2 °C 28 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Aug after 33.2 °C 16 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
21 Aug after 34.3 °C 25 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Aug after 31.9 °C 25 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
23 Aug after 31.4 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
24 Aug after 26.7 °C 33 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 34

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 6 Aug 2017
After · 21 Aug 2017

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 15 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 13 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak13 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1022 µg/m³
11121314151617
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 · 7Every 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 Chaves fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 13 August 2017 and 14 August 2017: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 13 August 2017 at 16:22 and declared extinguished on 14 August 2017.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 439 hectares (4.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: Santo António de Monforte (212 ha, 18 %); Paradela (133 ha, 16 %); Lama de Arcos (92 ha, 6.8 %); Águas Frias (3 ha, 0.1 %); Mairos (0 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 0.8 km of Santo António de Monforte. 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 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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.