Mula fire, August 2020 Mula, Bullas, Cehegín
The fire started on 29 August 2020 in Mula, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 460 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.
Number 21 in Spain in 2020, of 89.
The power measured by the satellite is low (11.8 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
- 460ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 29 Aug 2020 – 30 Aug 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 29 Aug
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 13
- in a single hotspot: 12 MW
- Danger at start
- 18
- Moderate · FWI index
- Energy released
- 60MW
- 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 27 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
-
337 ha reached on 30 Aug0.5 %
-
Bullas 12,027 inhabitants · 4.0 km from the town123 ha reached on 30 Aug1.5 %
-
Cehegín 14,506 inhabitants · 16.2 km from the town1 ha0.0 %
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
- Coniferous forest58 %
- Agricultural areas26 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland16 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 0 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
Official record
According to EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 29 August 2020 and burned 346 ha (the satellite measured 460 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.
- Mula Sierra de la Silla 29 August 2020 · 17:46 346 ha · extinguished on 3 September 2020 · cause: unknown
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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29 Aug | 30.5 °C | 22 % | 37 km/h | 2.6 mm | Moderate 18 |
| 30 Aug | 26.2 °C | 28 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
| 31 Aug after | 26.0 °C | 37 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 1 Sept after | 24.6 °C | 44 % | 23 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 2 Sept after | 27.7 °C | 41 % | 34 km/h | 0.5 mm | High 27 |
| 3 Sept after | 28.0 °C | 39 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 4 Sept after | 27.6 °C | 40 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 5 Sept after | 27.9 °C | 42 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 6 Sept after | 28.2 °C | 41 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 7 Sept after | 27.7 °C | 46 % | 38 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 30 |
| 8 Sept after | 23.7 °C | 43 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 9 Sept after | 28.2 °C | 30 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 31 |
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 31 August 2020 the air beside the fire reached 16 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO 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 · 13Every 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 Mula fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 29 August 2020 and 30 August 2020: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 460 hectares (4.6 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Mula (337 ha, 0.5 %); Bullas (123 ha, 1.5 %); Cehegín (1 ha, 0.0 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 4.0 km of Bullas. 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 30.5 °C, humidity dropped to 22 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 31, class 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
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 (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.