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Fermoselle fire, 27 August 2017 Fermoselle, Villar del Buey, Trabanca

Out · last detection 3 Sept 2017, 14:25 UTC

The fire started on 27 August 2017 in Fermoselle, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 2,199 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 7th largest in Zamora since 2016 (of 45 with a page). Number 11 in Spain in 2017, of 144.

Burnt area
2,199ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
8days
27 Aug 2017 – 3 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
27 Aug
2017
Heat detections
77
in a single hotspot: 53 MW
Danger at start
60
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
762MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

3 Sept 2017
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 27 Aug3 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

27283

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
55km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 49 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. Fermoselle 1,131 inhabitants · 1.2 km from the town where it started
    1,464 ha reached on 26 Aug
    21 %
  2. Villar del Buey 483 inhabitants · 16.5 km from the town
    724 ha reached on 27 Aug
    5.4 %
  3. Trabanca 159 inhabitants · 4.3 km from the town
    13 ha reached on 26 Aug
    0.4 %

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

  • Sclerophyllous scrub53 %
  • Other natural land22 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland11 %
  • Agricultural areas10 %
  • Broadleaved forest4.9 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

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.

Official record

According to EGIF (MITECO), 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 1,647 ha (the satellite measured 2,199 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

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.

Checked against the press

Checked on 2 October 2026

We checked this page against 3 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:

Also known as
Incendio de Fermoselle y Villar del Buey · Incendio del paraje El Picón (Fermoselle)
Official area reported: 2,844 ha (the satellite measured 2,199 ha)
Declared extinguished: 10 September 2017

Sources

Official figures are measured differently from satellite ones and sometimes cover only part of the fire.

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)
26 Aug 30.8 °C 20 % 55 km/h 0.1 mm Extreme 60
27 Aug 26.0 °C 34 % 53 km/h 1.9 mm Moderate 21
28 Aug 27.3 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.5 mm High 32
29 Aug 25.2 °C 34 % 24 km/h 0.3 mm High 28
30 Aug 22.9 °C 47 % 38 km/h 3.1 mm Low 8
31 Aug 24.9 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
1 Sept 24.5 °C 28 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
2 Sept 26.7 °C 17 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
3 Sept 29.0 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
4 Sept after 27.3 °C 35 % 23 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
5 Sept after 30.3 °C 19 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
6 Sept after 29.0 °C 26 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
7 Sept after 28.4 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
8 Sept after 28.8 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
9 Sept after 20.3 °C 32 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
10 Sept after 22.9 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
11 Sept after 25.8 °C 28 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 39
12 Sept after 25.0 °C 31 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
13 Sept after 28.6 °C 20 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 38

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 20 Aug 2017
After · 10 Sept 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 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 18 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak18 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1035 µg/m³
2425262728293031123456
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 · 77Every 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 Spain ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Fermoselle fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 27 August 2017 and 3 September 2017: 8 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 2,199 hectares (22.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Fermoselle (1,464 ha, 21 %); Villar del Buey (724 ha, 5.4 %); Trabanca (13 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.2 km of Fermoselle. 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 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 55 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 60, 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

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 (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.