Fonte Arcada e Oliveira fire, September 2016 Fonte Arcada e Oliveira, Vilela, Póvoa de Lanhoso (Nossa Senhora do Amparo)
The fire started on 5 September 2016 in Fonte Arcada e Oliveira, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 101 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 4 September 2016 at 15:40 and declared extinguished on 5 September 2016.
It is the 11th largest in Póvoa de Lanhoso since 2016 (of 11 with a page). Number 178 in Portugal in 2016, of 181.
Compare with…
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
- 101ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 5 Sept 2016 – 5 Sept 2016
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- freguesias
- Started on
- 5 Sept
- 2016
- Danger at start
- 29
- High · FWI index
Where it burned
The weather it burned in
It had gone 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 30.5 mm on 13 Sept.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
57 ha5.2 %
-
Vilela 0.9 km from the centre25 ha5.5 %
-
Póvoa de Lanhoso (Nossa Senhora do Amparo) 5,623 inhabitants · 1.6 km from the centre19 ha3.4 %
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
- Scrub and transitional woodland90 %
- Agricultural areas10 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
Official record
According to ICNF, this fire started on 4 September 2016 and burned 82 ha (the satellite measured 101 ha).
- Póvoa de Lanhoso Fonte Arcada 4 September 2016 · 15:40 82 ha · extinguished on 5 September 2016 · cause: arson
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 Sept | 32.4 °C | 29 % | 21 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 6 Sept after | 36.0 °C | 27 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 37 |
| 7 Sept after | 27.5 °C | 46 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 8 Sept after | 25.1 °C | 43 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 9 Sept after | 25.6 °C | 36 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 10 Sept after | 25.0 °C | 55 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 11 Sept after | 26.5 °C | 52 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 21 |
| 12 Sept after | 26.5 °C | 51 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 13 Sept after | 20.1 °C | 64 % | 55 km/h | 30.5 mm | Very low 0 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 7 September 2016 the air beside the fire reached 155 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 62: 4.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
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
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Fonte Arcada e Oliveira fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 5 September 2016 and 5 September 2016: 1 day between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 4 September 2016 at 15:40 and declared extinguished on 5 September 2016.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 101 hectares (1.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Fonte Arcada e Oliveira (57 ha, 5.2 %); Vilela (25 ha, 5.5 %); Póvoa de Lanhoso (Nossa Senhora do Amparo) (19 ha, 3.4 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire came within 0.9 km of the centre of Vilela, 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 32.4 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 21 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, class 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
- ICNF · Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas ↗
- ANEPC · Proteção Civil ↗
- Fogos.pt (ocorrências em tempo real) ↗
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. No Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with ICNF: 82 official ha against 101 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
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.