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ES · Spain · –

Los Realejos fire, July 2022 La Guancha, San Juan de la Rambla, Los Realejos

Out · last detection 24 Jul 2022, 13:13 UTC

The fire started on 21 July 2022 in Los Realejos, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 2,846 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 5 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 21 July 2022 at 10:22 and declared extinguished on 10 September 2022.

Number 21 in Spain in 2022, of 196.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Artenara · 2019Arafo · 2023Arico · 2021Granadilla de Abona · 2018

Burnt area
2,846ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
5days
21 Jul 2022 – 25 Jul 2022
Municipalities hit
5
municipalities
Started on
21 Jul
2022
Heat detections
224
in a single hotspot: 143 MW
Danger at start
42
Very high · FWI index
Average daily power
1.5GW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 21 Jul25 Jul
24 Jul 2022

How it evolved, day by day

21 Jul 2022 · 1,278 MW · 21 22 Jul 2022 · 224 MW · 26 23 Jul 2022 · 4,426 MW · 146 24 Jul 2022 · 108 MW · 31
21 Jul 22 Jul 23 Jul 24 Jul

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

The weather it burned in

31°high
57km/h · peak gust
15%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months 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.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.8% of the area of London (28 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. La Guancha 5,667 inhabitants · 2.5 km from the centre
    962 ha reached on 22 Jul
    40 %
  2. San Juan de la Rambla 4,987 inhabitants · 4.3 km from the centre
    874 ha reached on 21 Jul
    42 %
  3. Los Realejos 42,514 inhabitants · 7.6 km from the centre where it started
    778 ha reached on 21 Jul
    14 %
  4. Icod de los Vinos 24,616 inhabitants · 4.8 km from the centre
    234 ha reached on 23 Jul
    2.4 %
  5. La Orotava
    8 ha
    0.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

What burned

  • Coniferous forest64 %
  • Other natural land31 %
  • Agricultural areas3.5 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub1.4 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 99 %

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 EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 21 July 2022 and burned 2,710 ha (the satellite measured 2,846 ha).

MITECO, Estadística General de Incendios Forestales (EGIF). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

Checked against the press

Checked on 30 September 2026

We checked this page against 4 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:

Also known as
Incendio forestal de Los Realejos · Incendio de Los Campeches · Incendio del norte de Tenerife
Official area reported: 2,753 ha (the satellite measured 2,846 ha)
Declared extinguished: 10 September 2022

Sources

Official figures are measured differently from satellite ones and sometimes cover only part of the fire.

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)

Started with Strong wind: 22 % of the area in Spain 60 days without rain: 5.1 % of the area in Spain

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
21 Jul 25.4 °C 25 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Jul 23.9 °C 35 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
23 Jul 25.8 °C 35 % 45 km/h 0.5 mm Very high 39
24 Jul 26.5 °C 26 % 38 km/h 0.2 mm Very high 41
25 Jul 31.1 °C 15 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
26 Jul after 31.4 °C 15 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 50
27 Jul after 26.5 °C 22 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
28 Jul after 20.2 °C 45 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
29 Jul after 19.2 °C 58 % 60 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
30 Jul after 20.8 °C 48 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Jul after 24.0 °C 35 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
1 Aug after 24.2 °C 35 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
2 Aug after 26.0 °C 25 % 54 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
3 Aug after 26.3 °C 25 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
4 Aug after 24.5 °C 31 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 42.2, a minimum humidity of 25% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 1.

FWI at the start 42.2
Minimum humidity 25 %
Days without rain 60+
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Artenara fire, August 2019
8,867 ha 6 days FWI 41.2 Min. humidity 40 % 100 km away, in 2019

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

See its page Compare with this fire

What happened to them

Fires in the area that started in similar weather: 1. With fewer than 15 we give no figures: they would be more noise than signal.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
57km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 25 Jul, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 14 Jul 2022
After · 1 Aug 2022

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 224Every 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 Spain

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Los Realejos fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 21 July 2022 and 25 July 2022: 5 days between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 21 July 2022 at 10:22 and declared extinguished on 10 September 2022.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 2,846 hectares (28.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: La Guancha (962 ha, 40 %); San Juan de la Rambla (874 ha, 42 %); Los Realejos (778 ha, 14 %); Icod de los Vinos (234 ha, 2.4 %); La Orotava (8 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire came within 2.5 km of the centre of La Guancha, the closest of the areas it touched. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.1 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 57 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 46, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Spain (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 · Emergency number and official warnings

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

No changes since 24 October 2026.

RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 224 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • Compared with EGIF (MITECO): 2,710 official ha against 2,846 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
  • Checked against news and agencies: 4 confirmed sources.
  • Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.