Kea fire, May 2021 Kea
The fire started on 24 May 2021 in Kea, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 227 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 17th largest in South Aegean since 2016 (of 25 with a page). Number 31 in Greece in 2021, of 45.
- Burnt area
- 227ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 24 May 2021 – 25 May 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 24 May
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 2
- in a single hotspot: 32 MW
- Danger at start
- 10
- Low · FWI index
- Energy released
- 34MW
- 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 29 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
-
Kea where it started226 ha reached on 24 May1.5 %
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 land95 %
- Agricultural areas4.8 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24 May | 20.7 °C | 69 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 10 |
| 25 May | 21.6 °C | 67 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 26 May after | 21.2 °C | 69 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 11 |
| 27 May after | 20.4 °C | 72 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 9 |
| 28 May after | 20.1 °C | 78 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 9 |
| 29 May after | 19.6 °C | 72 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 11 |
| 30 May after | 20.1 °C | 64 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 8 |
| 31 May after | 19.6 °C | 76 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 11 |
| 1 Jun after | 19.5 °C | 57 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 2 Jun after | 19.6 °C | 52 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 3 Jun after | 19.7 °C | 64 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 11 |
| 4 Jun after | 20.2 °C | 65 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
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 24 May 2021 the air beside the fire reached 49 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 18: 1.2 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 · 2Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 546 haLavreotiki ΛαυρεωτικήςAugust 2021 · 1 day · 28 km away
- 455 haLavreotiki ΛαυρεωτικήςJune 2024 · 1 day · 28 km away
- 1,901 haLavreotiki ΛαυρεωτικήςAugust 2025 · 3 days · 30 km away
- 1,038 haLavreotiki ΛαυρεωτικήςSeptember 2020 · 1 day · 33 km away
- 726 haKithnosAugust 2023 · 1 day · 33 km away
- 3,931 haLavreotiki ΛαυρεωτικήςJuly 2023 · 2 days · 36 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Kea fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 24 May 2021 and 25 May 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 227 hectares (2.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Kea (226 ha, 1.5 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 21.6 °C, humidity dropped to 67 % and gusts hit 28 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Greece (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 · 199
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 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.