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Istres fire, August 2017 Istres, Saint-Mitre-les-Remparts

Out · last detection 1 Aug 2017, 13:03 UTC

The fire started on 1 August 2017 in Istres, France, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 104 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 17th largest in Bouches-du-Rhône since 2016 (of 18 with a page). Number 26 in France in 2017, of 27.

Burnt area
104ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
1 Aug 2017 – 1 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
2
communes
Started on
1 Aug
2017
Heat detections
4
in a single hotspot: 262 MW
Danger at start
58
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
380MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 1 Aug1 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

1

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
66km/h · peak gust
36%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 3.3 mm on 8 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. Istres 44,292 inhabitants · 2.4 km from the town where it started
    100 ha reached on 1 Aug
    0.9 %
  2. Saint-Mitre-les-Remparts 6,175 inhabitants · 3.2 km from the town
    4 ha
    0.2 %

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 land66 %
  • Coniferous forest27 %
  • Artificial surfaces6.7 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 19 %

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 BDIFF, a fire of 73 ha was recorded in Istres on 1 August 2017 (the satellite measured 104 ha). The record has no coordinates, so it was matched by municipality and date. The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

BDIFF (Base de Données sur les Incendies de Forêts en France). 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)
1 Aug 33.9 °C 36 % 66 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
2 Aug after 35.1 °C 34 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
3 Aug after 34.7 °C 38 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
4 Aug after 39.1 °C 26 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
5 Aug after 38.6 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
6 Aug after 33.1 °C 23 % 54 km/h 0.8 mm Extreme 52
7 Aug after 33.6 °C 20 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
8 Aug after 27.2 °C 45 % 40 km/h 3.3 mm Low 10

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 25 Jul 2017
After · 8 Aug 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 2 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 27 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 22: 1.5 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak27 µg/m³
Days over the guideline4 days
PM1060 µg/m³
30311234
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 · 4Every 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 France ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Istres fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 1 August 2017 and 1 August 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 104 hectares (1.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Istres (100 ha, 0.9 %); Saint-Mitre-les-Remparts (4 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.4 km of Istres. 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 33.9 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 66 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 58, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of France (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 · 18

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 · 18.

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 ADM5 (Open Data Commons Attribution 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.