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Ciminna fire, October 2023 Ciminna

Out · last measured on 23 Oct 2023

The fire started on 23 October 2023 in Ciminna, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 107 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 166th largest in Palermo since 2016 (of 178 with a page). Number 193 in Italy in 2023, of 207.

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
107ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
23 Oct 2023 – 23 Oct 2023
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
23 Oct
2023
Danger at start
5
Low · FWI index
Natura 2000
54%
of the perimeter is protected land

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

24°high
26km/h · peak gust
48%lowest humidity

It had gone one day without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.4 mm on 25 Oct.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Ciminna 3,428 inhabitants · 2.6 km from the town where it started
    107 ha
    1.9 %

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 areas79 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub21 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 54 %

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.

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 Oct 23.8 °C 48 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm Low 5
24 Oct after 25.1 °C 59 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Low 7
25 Oct after 21.1 °C 70 % 35 km/h 1.4 mm Very low 3

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 16 Oct 2023
After · 30 Oct 2023

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 21 October 2023 the air beside the fire reached 36 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak36 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1084 µg/m³
Optical depth1.06
212223242526
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ciminna fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 23 October 2023 and 23 October 2023: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 107 hectares (1.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Ciminna (107 ha, 1.9 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.6 km of Ciminna. 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 23.8 °C, humidity dropped to 48 % and gusts hit 26 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 5, class Low.
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
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 · 1515.

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.