Gallegos de Argañán fire, July 2017 Gallegos de Argañán
The fire started on 19 July 2017 in Gallegos de Argañán, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 383 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 7th largest in Salamanca since 2016 (of 16 with a page). Number 66 in Spain in 2017, of 144.
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
- 383ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 19 Jul 2017 – 19 Jul 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 19 Jul
- 2017
- Danger at start
- 26
- High · FWI index
- Natura 2000
- 100%
- of the perimeter is protected land
Where it burned
The weather it burned in
It had gone 10 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
-
383 ha8.1 %
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 land58 %
- Agricultural areas33 %
- Sclerophyllous scrub8.6 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %
- ZEPA + LIC Campo de Argañán ES4150098 · ES0000218
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), this fire started on 17 July 2017 and burned 190 ha (the satellite measured 383 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.
- Gallegos de Argañán Los Conejeros 17 July 2017 · 17:30 190 ha · extinguished on 19 July 2017 · cause: arson
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Jul | 26.0 °C | 44 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 20 Jul after | 26.8 °C | 31 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 21 Jul after | 26.4 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 22 Jul after | 27.6 °C | 36 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 23 Jul after | 29.8 °C | 24 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 24 Jul after | 29.7 °C | 27 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 25 Jul after | 29.8 °C | 23 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 26 Jul after | 31.7 °C | 21 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 27 Jul after | 33.0 °C | 18 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 28 Jul after | 32.2 °C | 19 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 29 Jul after | 32.3 °C | 26 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
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 17 July 2017 the air beside the fire reached 15 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO 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 Gallegos de Argañán fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 19 July 2017 and 19 July 2017: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 383 hectares (3.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Gallegos de Argañán (383 ha, 8.1 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Gallegos de Argañán and came within 0.6 km of its centre. 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 26.0 °C, humidity dropped to 44 % and gusts hit 38 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 26, class High.
- 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. No Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with EGIF (MITECO): 190 official ha against 383 ha of perimeter; similar, but with reservations.
- 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 (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.