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Erice fire, June 2017 Erice, Valderice

Out · last detection 29 Jun 2017, 00:18 UTC

The fire started on 28 June 2017 in Erice, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 672 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 13th largest in Trapani since 2016 (of 68 with a page). Number 24 in Italy in 2017, of 361.

Burnt area
672ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
28 Jun 2017 – 29 Jun 2017
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
28 Jun
2017
Heat detections
7
in a single hotspot: 93 MW
Danger at start
56
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
209MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

29 Jun 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 28 Jun29 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

2829

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
55km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 21 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. Erice where it started
    671 ha reached on 28 Jun
    14 %
  2. Valderice 11,480 inhabitants · 2.7 km from the town
    3 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 areas45 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub41 %
  • Broadleaved forest7.2 %
  • Coniferous forest5.7 %
  • Artificial surfaces1.0 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 76 %

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)
28 Jun 35.2 °C 20 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
29 Jun 30.4 °C 29 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38
30 Jun after 34.0 °C 23 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
1 Jul after 26.3 °C 48 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
2 Jul after 25.6 °C 41 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
3 Jul after 26.9 °C 41 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
4 Jul after 29.0 °C 35 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Jul after 30.9 °C 27 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
6 Jul after 31.7 °C 29 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
7 Jul after 33.2 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
8 Jul after 33.0 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
9 Jul after 32.7 °C 20 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 21 Jun 2017
After · 6 Jul 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 26 June 2017 the air beside the fire reached 19 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 15: 1.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak19 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1034 µg/m³
262728293012
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 Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Erice fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 28 June 2017 and 29 June 2017: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 672 hectares (6.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Erice (671 ha, 14 %); Valderice (3 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.7 km of Valderice. 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 35.2 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 56, class Extreme.
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.