Ciudad Real fire, June 2021 Ciudad Real, Alcolea de Calatrava, Corral de Calatrava
The fire started on 10 June 2021 in Ciudad Real, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 527 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 4 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 10 June 2021 at 18:34 and declared extinguished on 12 June 2021.
It is the 8th largest in Ciudad Real since 2016 (of 24 with a page). Number 24 in Spain in 2021, of 124.
The power measured by the satellite is low (1.7 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 527ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 10 Jun 2021 – 11 Jun 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 4
- municipalities
- Started on
- 10 Jun
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 4
- in a single hotspot: 2 MW
- Danger at start
- 51
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 5MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
11 Jun 2021 · 5 MW · 4
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 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 13 Jun.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
165 ha reached on 11 Jun0.6 %
-
Alcolea de Calatrava 1,360 inhabitants · 7.1 km from the centre139 ha2.0 %
-
114 ha0.8 %
-
Poblete 2,998 inhabitants · 4.1 km from the centre110 ha3.9 %
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 land77 %
- Agricultural areas21 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland1.9 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 4 %
- LIC Lagunas volcánicas del Campo de Calatrava ES4220005
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.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2020Inside 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 EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 10 June 2021 and burned 423 ha (the satellite measured 527 ha).
- Corral de Calatrava Castillo de Herrera 10 June 2021 · 18:34 423 ha · extinguished on 12 June 2021 · cause: negligence
MITECO, Estadística General de Incendios Forestales (EGIF). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Jun | 36.1 °C | 11 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 51 |
| 11 Jun | 34.2 °C | 14 % | 30 km/h | 0.2 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 12 Jun after | 34.2 °C | 18 % | 50 km/h | 0.5 mm | Extreme 56 |
| 13 Jun after | 33.6 °C | 19 % | 44 km/h | 1.0 mm | Very high 41 |
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 · 4Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 232 haFernán CaballeroJuly 2018 · 1 day · 22 km away
- 213 haValenzuela de CalatravaJune 2017 · 1 day · 23 km away
- 759 haArgamasilla de CalatravaJuly 2024 · 2 days · 24 km away
- 239 haPuertollanoJuly 2019 · 2 days · 33 km away
- 852 haHinojosas de CalatravaJuly 2026 · 1 day · 38 km away
- 2,509 haMalagónJuly 2022 · 8 days · 39 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Ciudad Real fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 10 June 2021 and 11 June 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 10 June 2021 at 18:34 and declared extinguished on 12 June 2021.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 527 hectares (5.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 4 municipalities: Ciudad Real (165 ha, 0.6 %); Alcolea de Calatrava (139 ha, 2.0 %); Corral de Calatrava (114 ha, 0.8 %); Poblete (110 ha, 3.9 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire came within 4.1 km of the centre of Poblete, 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 36.1 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 33 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Spain (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
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.
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
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 4 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with EGIF (MITECO): 423 official ha against 527 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.
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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.