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Iglesias fire, June 2017 Iglesias

Out · last measured on 30 Jun 2017

The fire started on 30 June 2017 in Iglesias, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 179 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 22th largest in Sud Sardegna since 2016 (of 37 with a page). Number 193 in Italy in 2017, of 361.

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
179ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
30 Jun 2017 – 30 Jun 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
30 Jun
2017
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

28°high
42km/h · peak gust
33%lowest humidity

It had gone 23 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.7 mm on 2 Jul.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Iglesias 25,093 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the town where it started
    179 ha
    0.9 %

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

  • Other natural land84 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland9.6 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub6.2 %
  • Artificial surfaces0.6 %

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

Official record

According to CFVA Sardegna, this fire started on 26 June 2017 and burned 247 ha (the satellite measured 179 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

Regione Autonoma della Sardegna, Corpo Forestale e di Vigilanza Ambientale: perimetri delle aree percorse dal fuoco (CC BY 4.0). 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)
30 Jun 28.5 °C 33 % 42 km/h 1.0 mm High 30
1 Jul after 27.2 °C 38 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Jul after 25.0 °C 54 % 59 km/h 1.7 mm Moderate 18

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 23 Jun 2017
After · 7 Jul 2017

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 28 June 2017 the air beside the fire reached 24 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak24 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1043 µg/m³
282930123
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Iglesias fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 30 June 2017 and 30 June 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 179 hectares (1.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Iglesias (179 ha, 0.9 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.7 km of Iglesias. 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 28.5 °C, humidity dropped to 33 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 30, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Italy (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 · 1515

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
What do you think is wrong?

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 · 1515.

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 ADM4 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License). 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.