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Nisa fire, August 2025 Gáfete, Espírito Santo, Nossa Senhora da Graça e São Simão, Tolosa

Out · last detection 16 Aug 2025, 13:36 UTC

The fire started on 16 August 2025 in Gáfete, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 124 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 4 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 15 August 2025 at 18:13 and declared extinguished on 16 August 2025.

Number 77 in Portugal in 2025, of 85.

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.

Burnt area
124ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
16 Aug 2025 – 16 Aug 2025
Municipalities hit
4
freguesias
Started on
16 Aug
2025
Heat detections
1
in a single hotspot: 4 MW
Danger at start
48
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
4MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Aug16 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

16

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

The weather it burned in

39°high
30km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 3 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

  1. Gáfete 688 inhabitants · 1.9 km from the town where it started
    70 ha reached on 16 Aug
    1.5 %
  2. Espírito Santo, Nossa Senhora da Graça e São Simão 2,997 inhabitants · 10.7 km from the town
    37 ha
    0.2 %
  3. Tolosa 811 inhabitants · 4.1 km from the town
    16 ha
    0.7 %
  4. Alpalhão 989 inhabitants · 4.3 km from the town
    0 ha
    0.0 %

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

  • Agricultural areas50 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub34 %
  • Broadleaved forest16 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 97 %

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 ICNF, this fire started on 15 August 2025 and burned 114 ha (the satellite measured 124 ha).

ICNF (Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas). This is the agency’s operational record: its figures may be revised when the year’s statistics are closed.

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)
16 Aug 39.1 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
17 Aug after 36.7 °C 22 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
18 Aug after 31.5 °C 29 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Aug after 30.3 °C 29 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
20 Aug after 30.0 °C 31 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 47
21 Aug after 30.9 °C 30 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
22 Aug after 34.2 °C 19 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
23 Aug after 34.7 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
24 Aug after 31.9 °C 32 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
25 Aug after 33.2 °C 30 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
26 Aug after 33.1 °C 27 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 9 Aug 2025
After · 23 Aug 2025

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 · Copernicus

On 17 August 2025 the air beside the fire reached 49 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 27: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak49 µg/m³
Days over the guideline3 days
PM1091 µg/m³
Optical depth0.53
141516171819
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 · 1Every 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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Nisa fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 16 August 2025 and 16 August 2025: 1 day between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 15 August 2025 at 18:13 and declared extinguished on 16 August 2025.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 124 hectares (1.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 4 municipalities: Gáfete (70 ha, 1.5 %); Espírito Santo, Nossa Senhora da Graça e São Simão (37 ha, 0.2 %); Tolosa (16 ha, 0.7 %); Alpalhão (0 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.9 km of Gáfete. 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 39.1 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 48, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Portugal (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.

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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.

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.