Monteverde fire, August 2026 Monteverde, Melfi
The fire started on 28 August 2026 in Monteverde, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 584 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
Number 33 in Italy in 2026, of 231.
The power measured by the satellite is low (30.0 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
- Burnt area
- 584ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 28 Aug 2026 – 29 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 28 Aug
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 21
- in a single hotspot: 30 MW
- Danger at start
- 58
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 258MW
- 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 11 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 8 ha in 2024.
What happened to each town
-
564 ha reached on 28 Aug14 %
-
Melfi 17,092 inhabitants · 10.2 km from the town21 ha0.1 %
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
- Agricultural areas88 %
- Broadleaved forest8.3 %
- Other natural land3.8 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28 Aug | 41.2 °C | 14 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 29 Aug | 36.8 °C | 18 % | 62 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 70 |
| 30 Aug after | 36.0 °C | 19 % | 46 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 61 |
| 31 Aug after | 34.5 °C | 37 % | 26 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 35 |
| 1 Sept after | 32.8 °C | 33 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 38 |
| 2 Sept after | 33.8 °C | 23 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 3 Sept after | 30.6 °C | 33 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 45 |
| 4 Sept after | 32.2 °C | 26 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 5 Sept after | 35.7 °C | 19 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 6 Sept after | 34.3 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 7 Sept after | 34.0 °C | 28 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 49 |
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 30 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 25 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 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 · 21Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Monteverde fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 28 August 2026 to 29 August 2026 (2 days). The perimeter dates it from 28 August 2026 to 28 August 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 584 hectares (5.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Monteverde (564 ha, 14 %); Melfi (21 ha, 0.1 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.3 km of Monteverde. 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 41.2 °C, humidity dropped to 14 % and gusts hit 38 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 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
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.