Gördes fire, August 2024 Gördes, Salihli, Köprübaşı
The fire started on 14 August 2024 in Gördes, Türkiye, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 5,292 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the largest fire in Manisa since 2016 (of 23 with a page). Number 2 in Türkiye in 2024, of 271.
- Burnt area
- 5,292ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 5days
- 14 Aug 2024 – 18 Aug 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- districts
- Started on
- 14 Aug
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 167
- in a single hotspot: 120 MW
- Danger at start
- 61
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 822MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
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 32 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.0 mm on 26 Aug.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
3,377 ha reached on 14 Aug3.4 %
-
Salihli 161,562 inhabitants · 21.6 km from the town1,921 ha reached on 16 Aug1.4 %
-
Köprübaşı 13,347 inhabitants · 22.9 km from the town0 ha0.0 %
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
- Coniferous forest39 %
- Agricultural areas28 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland21 %
- Other natural land7.8 %
- Mixed forest3.7 %
- Other land cover1.3 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
Checked against the press
Checked on 29 September 2026We checked this page against 4 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:
- Also known as
- Gördes yangını · Gördes-Salihli yangını · Boyalı yangını
- Declared under control (not yet extinguished): 19 August 2024
Sources
- Gördes-Salihli Yangını Basın Açıklaması — T.C. Manisa Valiliği, 19 August 2024 · official source
- Gördes ve Salihli ilçelerinde meydana gelen yangın afetiyle ilgili Bakan Yardımcımız Hasan Suver sahada hasar tespit çalışmalarına katılmıştır — Manisa Çevre, Şehircilik ve İklim Değişikliği İl Müdürlüğü (csb.gov.tr) · official source
- Gördes yangını da kontrol altında — Yeni Şafak, 20 August 2024
- Manisa'daki orman yangınında 5'inci gün! Alevler Salihli ilçesine ulaştı — Milliyet, 18 August 2024
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14 Aug | 42.1 °C | 9 % | 55 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 15 Aug | 41.0 °C | 14 % | 57 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 48 |
| 16 Aug | 38.0 °C | 12 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 63 |
| 17 Aug | 36.6 °C | 18 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 18 Aug | 36.4 °C | 23 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 19 Aug after | 36.7 °C | 19 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 44 |
| 20 Aug after | 38.3 °C | 21 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 21 Aug after | 35.0 °C | 33 % | 36 km/h | 0.4 mm | Very high 46 |
| 22 Aug after | 36.0 °C | 25 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 35 |
| 23 Aug after | 37.8 °C | 20 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 33 |
| 24 Aug after | 37.2 °C | 19 % | 52 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
| 25 Aug after | 36.3 °C | 21 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 26 Aug after | 34.3 °C | 28 % | 31 km/h | 1.0 mm | High 31 |
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 19 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 42 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 22: 1.4 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 · 167Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Gördes fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 14 August 2024 and 18 August 2024: 5 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 5,292 hectares (52.9 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Gördes (3,377 ha, 3.4 %); Salihli (1,921 ha, 1.4 %); Köprübaşı (0 ha, 0.0 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 19.5 km of Gördes. 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 42.1 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 63, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Türkiye (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
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 ADM2 (Open Data Commons Open Database License 1.0). 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.