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HR · Croatia · –

Općina Promina fire, 17 August 2017 Općina Promina, Općina Biskupija, Grad Drniš

Out · last detection 24 Aug 2017, 01:07 UTC

The fire started on 17 August 2017 in Općina Promina, Croatia, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 2,092 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

It is the 5th largest in Šibenik-Knin since 2016 (of 56 with a page). Number 7 in Croatia in 2017, of 78.

Burnt area
2,092ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
8days
17 Aug 2017 – 24 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
17 Aug
2017
Heat detections
87
in a single hotspot: 188 MW
Danger at start
25
High · FWI index
Average daily power
192MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 17 Aug24 Aug
24 Aug 2017

How it evolved, day by day

17 Aug 2017 · 7 MW · 3 18 Aug 2017 · 739 MW · 13 19 Aug 2017 · 331 MW · 40 22 Aug 2017 · 71 MW · 27 23 Aug 2017 · 4 MW · 2 24 Aug 2017 · 3 MW · 2
18 Aug 23 Aug

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
63km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity

It had gone 4 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 26.9 mm on 2 Sept.

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 1.3% of the area of London (21 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. Općina Promina where it started
    899 ha reached on 17 Aug
    6.4 %
  2. 748 ha reached on 18 Aug
    5.9 %
  3. 446 ha reached on 18 Aug
    1.3 %

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

  • Other natural land77 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland19 %
  • Agricultural areas3.4 %
  • Broadleaved forest0.9 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 100 %

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.

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)
17 Aug 30.0 °C 32 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
18 Aug 31.7 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
19 Aug 30.7 °C 31 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
20 Aug 21.5 °C 62 % 52 km/h 0.2 mm High 24
21 Aug 23.2 °C 33 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
22 Aug 23.1 °C 30 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Aug 26.9 °C 26 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 23
24 Aug 28.8 °C 24 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
25 Aug after 31.2 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
26 Aug after 31.8 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
27 Aug after 31.6 °C 30 % 30 km/h 0.5 mm High 38
28 Aug after 29.7 °C 33 % 34 km/h 0.4 mm High 36
29 Aug after 26.6 °C 38 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
30 Aug after 28.6 °C 24 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
31 Aug after 28.7 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
1 Sept after 24.4 °C 42 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
2 Sept after 23.8 °C 57 % 68 km/h 26.9 mm High 29

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 24.7, a minimum humidity of 32% and 4 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 25.

FWI at the start 24.7
Minimum humidity 32 %
Days without rain 4
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Općina Kijevo fire, August 2024
1,712 ha 3 days FWI 26.0 Min. humidity 32 % 24 km away, in 2024

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 19.3 mm on 19 Aug.

What happened to them

3 days
median duration
456 ha
median area
32 %
went past 1,000 ha
8.6 mm
rain at the end (median; 24 of 25 had it)

It was 4.6 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 8 days, against 3 days.

Only 3 of its 25 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 1 of 25, 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 8.6 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

26.9 mmfirst rain
2 Sept9 days after it ended
63km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 24 Aug, and on 2 Sept 26.9 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 24 of 25, with a median of 8.6 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.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 10 Aug 2017
After · 31 Aug 2017

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 19 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak20 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1024 µg/m³
15 Aug18 Aug21 Aug24 Aug27 Aug
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 · 87Every 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 Croatia

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Općina Promina fire last?
According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 17 August 2017 to 24 August 2017 (8 days). The perimeter dates it from 17 August 2017 to 22 August 2017.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 2,092 hectares (20.9 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Općina Promina (899 ha, 6.4 %); Općina Biskupija (748 ha, 5.9 %); Grad Drniš (446 ha, 1.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 31.7 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 63 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 34, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Croatia (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: 25. Their median duration was 3 days and their median area 456 ha; 32 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 3 of its 25 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 1 of 25, 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 8.6 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 · 193 · 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.

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 · 193.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 17 August 2017 to 22 August 2017. 87 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.

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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0). 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.