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Gondomar fire, 9 August 2016 Fânzeres e São Pedro da Cova, Foz do Sousa e Covelo, Valongo

Out · last detection 11 Aug 2016, 02:37 UTC

The fire started on 9 August 2016 in Fânzeres e São Pedro da Cova, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 790 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 5 municipalities. According to ICNF, the largest of the 3 recorded fires was detected on 8 August 2016 at 14:53 and declared extinguished on 9 August 2016.

Number 40 in Portugal in 2016, of 179.

Burnt area
790ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
3days
9 Aug 2016 – 11 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit
5
freguesias
Started on
9 Aug
2016
Heat detections
21
in a single hotspot: 56 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
355MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

11 Aug 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Aug11 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

91011

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

The weather it burned in

33°high
52km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 53 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.5 mm on 19 Aug.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Fânzeres e São Pedro da Cova 37,756 inhabitants where it started
    321 ha reached on 9 Aug
    15 %
  2. Foz do Sousa e Covelo 7,040 inhabitants · 2.6 km from the town
    316 ha reached on 9 Aug
    10 %
  3. Valongo 25,883 inhabitants · 4.0 km from the town
    64 ha
    2.6 %
  4. Gondomar (São Cosme), Valbom e Jovim 47,427 inhabitants · 2.2 km from the town
    53 ha reached on 10 Aug
    2.2 %
  5. Aguiar de Sousa 1,582 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town
    37 ha
    1.7 %

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

  • Scrub and transitional woodland88 %
  • Agricultural areas4.9 %
  • Artificial surfaces3.3 %
  • Mixed forest2.4 %
  • Broadleaved forest1.8 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 40 %

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 ICNF, 3 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 864 ha (the satellite measured 790 ha).

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)
9 Aug 32.4 °C 35 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
10 Aug 32.0 °C 20 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 Aug 32.8 °C 25 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 Aug after 33.7 °C 25 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
13 Aug after 31.7 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
14 Aug after 27.7 °C 43 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
15 Aug after 26.8 °C 48 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
16 Aug after 24.2 °C 51 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
17 Aug after 23.5 °C 69 % 32 km/h 0.1 mm Moderate 18
18 Aug after 26.6 °C 39 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
19 Aug after 23.1 °C 66 % 30 km/h 1.5 mm Low 9

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Aug 2016
After · 18 Aug 2016

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 11 August 2016 the air beside the fire reached 131 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 60: 4.0 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak131 µg/m³
Days over the guideline8 days
PM10165 µg/m³
7891011121314
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 · 21Every 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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Gondomar fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 9 August 2016 and 11 August 2016: 3 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, the largest of the 3 recorded fires was detected on 8 August 2016 at 14:53 and declared extinguished on 9 August 2016.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 790 hectares (7.9 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: Fânzeres e São Pedro da Cova (321 ha, 15 %); Foz do Sousa e Covelo (316 ha, 10 %); Valongo (64 ha, 2.6 %); Gondomar (São Cosme), Valbom e Jovim (53 ha, 2.2 %); Aguiar de Sousa (37 ha, 1.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Aguiar de Sousa. 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 32.8 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 52 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 53, 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

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
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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 (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.