Burned area
satellite only103ha
Perimeter published by EFFIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- perimeter revised on 26 January 2022
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
IT · Italy ·
Montebello Jonico fire, 23 July 2020 Montebello Jonico
Out · last detection 23 Jul 2020, 11:40 UTC
The fire started on 23 July 2020 in Montebello Jonico, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 103 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 97th largest in Reggio di Calabria since 2016 (of 101 with a page). Number 130 in Italy in 2020, of 140.
The power measured by the satellite is low (4.1 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only1day
23 Jul 2020 to 23 Jul 2020: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 23 Jul 2020, 11:40 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only23 Jul 2020
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 23 Jul 2020
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only3
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 4 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 23 Jul 2020 – 23 Jul 2020
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only12MW
Total radiative power on 23 July 2020; hotspots that day: 3.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 23 Jul 2020
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model17.0FWI · moderate
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 3.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 23 Jul 2020, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model28.4°C · 51% RH
High of 28.4 °C and minimum humidity of 51% on 23 July 2020; gusts of 31 km/h on 23 July 2020.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 23 Jul 2020 – 23 Jul 2020
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed perimeterEFFIS (Copernicus) revises the perimeter
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 103 ha
- Dates
- 23 Jul 2020 – 23 Jul 2020
- Name
- Montebello Jonico
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/montebello-jonico-2020-07-2?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire montebello-jonico-2020-07-2.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-07-23 | 3 | 12 | 28.4 | 21.3 | 51 | 12.6 | 30.6 | 0 | 17 | moderado | 1 |
| 2020-07-24 | 0 | 0 | 29.5 | 21.4 | 36 | 10.7 | 25.9 | 0 | 19.1 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-25 | 0 | 0 | 28.7 | 20.5 | 40 | 12.9 | 32.4 | 0 | 22.6 | alto | 0 |
| 2020-07-26 | 0 | 0 | 27.5 | 21.9 | 52 | 13.1 | 40 | 0 | 19.2 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-27 | 0 | 0 | 27.8 | 20.2 | 50 | 11.5 | 33.1 | 0 | 20.5 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-28 | 0 | 0 | 29.3 | 21.2 | 44 | 10.7 | 27 | 0 | 19.6 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-29 | 0 | 0 | 29.9 | 21.2 | 47 | 8.8 | 25.6 | 0 | 18.1 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-30 | 0 | 0 | 30.7 | 22.6 | 48 | 9.8 | 21.6 | 0 | 18.2 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-07-31 | 0 | 0 | 30.6 | 23.3 | 50 | 12.1 | 26.3 | 0 | 18.1 | moderado | 0 |
| 2020-08-01 | 0 | 0 | 30.6 | 23.1 | 44 | 12.6 | 32.8 | 0 | 26.7 | alto | 0 |
| 2020-08-02 | 0 | 0 | 30.7 | 22.9 | 45 | 10.9 | 28.1 | 0 | 21.1 | moderado | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: EFFIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 103ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 23 Jul 2020 – 23 Jul 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- municipalities
- Started on
- 23 Jul
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 3
- in a single hotspot: 4 MW
- Danger at start
- 17
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 12MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
23 Jul23 Jul
How it evolved, day by day
23 Jul 2020 · 12 MW · 3
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
28°high
31km/h · peak gust
51%lowest humidity
It had gone 3 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
68% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 70 ha in 2017.
What happened to each town
-
103 ha reached on 23 Jul1.8 %
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
- Broadleaved forest53 %
- Agricultural areas47 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 Jul | 28.4 °C | 51 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 24 Jul after | 29.5 °C | 36 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 25 Jul after | 28.7 °C | 40 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 26 Jul after | 27.5 °C | 52 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 27 Jul after | 27.8 °C | 50 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 28 Jul after | 29.3 °C | 44 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 29 Jul after | 29.9 °C | 47 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 30 Jul after | 30.7 °C | 48 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 31 Jul after | 30.6 °C | 50 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 1 Aug after | 30.6 °C | 44 % | 33 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 2 Aug after | 30.7 °C | 45 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 17.0, a minimum humidity of 51% and 3 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 17.
FWI at the start
17.0
Minimum humidity
51 %
Days without rain
3
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Montebello Jonico fire, 23 July 2020
103 ha
1 day
FWI 17.0
Min. humidity 51 %
Misilmeri fire, September 2022
937 ha
2 days
FWI 15.7
Min. humidity 51 %
207 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Maida fire, July 2017
125 ha
3 days
FWI 17.0
Min. humidity 48 %
119 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Grimaldi fire, August 2017
186 ha
8 days
FWI 17.8
Min. humidity 51 %
135 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.2 mm on 21 Aug.
Martirano Lombardo fire, August 2017
205 ha
3 days
FWI 17.9
Min. humidity 51 %
130 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.2 mm on 21 Aug.
Reggio di Calabria fire, August 2017
230 ha
4 days
FWI 19.8
Min. humidity 53 %
17 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.8 mm on 11 Aug.
What happened to them
- 3 days
- median duration
- 186 ha
- median area
- 0 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 3.8 mm
- rain at the end (median; 12 of 17 had it)
It stayed below its twins: 103 ha against a median of 186 ha. It lasted 1 day, against 3 days.
In 5 of 17, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.8 mm.
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
31km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 23 Jul, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 12 of 17, with a median of 3.8 mm.
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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 16 Jul 2020
After · 30 Jul 2020
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 22 July 2020 the air beside the fire reached 12 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak12 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1016 µg/m³
21 Jul23 Jul25 Jul
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 · 3Every 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 time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 3,114 haMotta San GiovanniJuly 2023 · 6 days · 4 km away
- 1,088 haReggio di Calabria27 July 2021 · 8 days · 8 km away
- 894 haReggio di Calabria18 July 2023 · 9 days · 16 km away
- 7,096 haBagaladi4 August 2021 · 6 days · 17 km away
- 911 haReggio di Calabria5 July 2017 · 9 days · 20 km away
- 1,199 haReggio di Calabria18 July 2023 · 9 days · 23 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Montebello Jonico fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 23 July 2020 and 23 July 2020: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 103 hectares (1.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Montebello Jonico (103 ha, 1.8 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Montebello Jonico and came within 2.8 km of its centre. 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 28.4 °C, humidity dropped to 51 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 17, class Moderate.
- 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.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 17. Their median duration was 3 days and their median area 186 ha; 0 % went past 1,000 ha. In 5 of 17, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.8 mm.
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 · 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
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 3 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
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.