Fornos de Algodres fire, October 2017 Aldeia Nova, Trancoso (São Pedro e Santa Maria) e Souto Maior, Maceira
The fire started on 15 October 2017 in Aldeia Nova, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 4,809 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 10 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 15 October 2017 at 22:25 and declared extinguished on 17 October 2017.
Number 17 in Portugal in 2017, of 211.
The power measured by the satellite is low (8.6 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
- 4,809ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 15 Oct 2017 – 16 Oct 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 10
- freguesias
- Started on
- 15 Oct
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 2
- in a single hotspot: 9 MW
- Danger at start
- 52
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 15MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
16 Oct 2017 · 15 MW · 2
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 45 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.8 mm on 17 Oct.
This area had burned before
2% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 95 ha in 2016.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Lisbon boundary: geoBoundaries · geoBoundaries, DG Territory (CC0 1.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
1,353 ha reached on 16 Oct50 %
-
Trancoso (São Pedro e Santa Maria) e Souto Maior 3,192 inhabitants · 3.7 km from the centre1,014 ha17 %
-
Maceira fire reached the centre611 ha76 %
-
Queiriz 227 inhabitants · 0.6 km from the centre385 ha40 %
-
Carapito 423 inhabitants · 2.3 km from the centre370 ha22 %
-
Rio de Mel 279 inhabitants · 0.7 km from the centre331 ha14 %
-
Sobral Pichorro e Fuinhas 227 inhabitants · 0.5 km from the centre272 ha18 %
-
Pena Verde 715 inhabitants · 2.4 km from the centre219 ha7.4 %
-
Cortiçô e Vila Chã 166 inhabitants · 0.5 km from the centre164 ha20 %
-
Matança 215 inhabitants · 2.5 km from the centre95 ha6.9 %
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 land43 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland33 %
- Agricultural areas14 %
- Coniferous forest9.5 %
- Mixed forest0.8 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2015Inside the perimeter there were about 8.3 hectares of built-up land and about 100 residents (GHSL 2015, 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 ICNF, this fire started on 15 October 2017 and burned 5,875 ha (the satellite measured 4,809 ha).
- Fornos de Algodres Cortiçô 15 October 2017 · 22:25 5,875 ha · extinguished on 17 October 2017 · 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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Oct | 29.6 °C | 19 % | 52 km/h | 0.3 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 16 Oct | 23.5 °C | 30 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 17 Oct after | 17.9 °C | 47 % | 52 km/h | 4.8 mm | Low 7 |
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 16 October 2017 the air beside the fire reached 247 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 107: 7.1 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)
Detections table · 2Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 8,554 haPenalva do Castelo Vila Cova do Covelo/MarecoSeptember 2024 · 5 days · 21 km away
- 9,523 haGuarda Alverca da Beira/Bouça CovaAugust 2025 · 3 days · 22 km away
- 78,447 haTrancoso Trancoso (São Pedro e Santa Maria) e Souto MaiorAugust 2025 · 11 days · 31 km away
- 19,125 haSeia Pamos Da SerraOctober 2017 · 8 days · 33 km away
- 25,260 haSerra da Estrela SameiroAugust 2022 · 18 days · 34 km away
- 8,991 haGuarda Rochoso e Monte Margarida17 July 2017 · 3 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Fornos de Algodres fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 15 October 2017 and 16 October 2017: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 15 October 2017 at 22:25 and declared extinguished on 17 October 2017.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 4,809 hectares (48.1 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 10 municipalities: Aldeia Nova (1,353 ha, 50 %); Trancoso (São Pedro e Santa Maria) e Souto Maior (1,014 ha, 17 %); Maceira (611 ha, 76 %); Queiriz (385 ha, 40 %); Carapito (370 ha, 22 %); Rio de Mel (331 ha, 14 %); Sobral Pichorro e Fuinhas (272 ha, 18 %); Pena Verde (219 ha, 7.4 %); Cortiçô e Vila Chã (164 ha, 20 %); Matança (95 ha, 6.9 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Aldeia Nova and reached its centre: the point marking it was inside the burnt area or less than 500 metres from it. That does not mean houses burned.
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 29.6 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, class Extreme.
- 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.
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How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 2 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with ICNF: 5,875 official ha against 4,809 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 2015, 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 (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.