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Ourém fire, 7 August 2023 União das Freguesias de Matas e Cercal, União das Freguesias de Gondemaria e Olival, Espite

Out · last detection 7 Aug 2023, 03:29 UTC

The fire started on 7 August 2023 in União das Freguesias de Matas e Cercal, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 245 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

Number 16 in Portugal in 2023, of 38.

The power measured by the satellite is low (9.4 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
245ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
7 Aug 2023 – 7 Aug 2023
Municipalities hit
3
freguesias
Started on
7 Aug
2023
Heat detections
8
in a single hotspot: 9 MW
Danger at start
43
Very high · FWI index
Energy released
32MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 7 Aug7 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

7

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

The weather it burned in

37°high
30km/h · peak gust
20%lowest humidity

It had gone 46 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: 2 ha in 2022.

What happened to each town

  1. União das Freguesias de Matas e Cercal 944 inhabitants · 1.2 km from the town where it started
    200 ha reached on 7 Aug
    9.7 %
  2. União das Freguesias de Gondemaria e Olival 1,995 inhabitants · 2.9 km from the town
    42 ha reached on 7 Aug
    1.4 %
  3. Espite 986 inhabitants · 1.9 km from the town
    3 ha
    0.1 %

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

  • Mixed forest55 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland27 %
  • Agricultural areas19 %

Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.

Official record

According to ICNF, 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 312 ha (the satellite measured 245 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

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)
7 Aug 36.9 °C 20 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
8 Aug after 32.5 °C 42 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
9 Aug after 26.5 °C 52 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
10 Aug after 26.6 °C 53 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
11 Aug after 27.7 °C 58 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
12 Aug after 25.8 °C 42 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
13 Aug after 23.2 °C 54 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
14 Aug after 24.0 °C 50 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
15 Aug after 24.0 °C 59 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
16 Aug after 24.1 °C 55 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 25
17 Aug after 25.2 °C 53 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 23

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 31 Jul 2023
After · 14 Aug 2023

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 8 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 26 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 18: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak26 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1052 µg/m³
Optical depth1.09
5678910
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 · 8Every 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 Ourém fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 7 August 2023 and 7 August 2023: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 245 hectares (2.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: União das Freguesias de Matas e Cercal (200 ha, 9.7 %); União das Freguesias de Gondemaria e Olival (42 ha, 1.4 %); Espite (3 ha, 0.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.2 km of União das Freguesias de Matas e Cercal. 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 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 30 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, 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.

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.

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.