Paredes fire, July 2025 Aguiar de Sousa, Recarei, Sobreira
The fire started on 30 July 2025 in Recarei, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 680 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 30 July 2025 at 10:47 and declared extinguished on 1 August 2025.
It is the 3th largest in Paredes since 2016 (of 10 with a page). Number 35 in Portugal in 2025, of 85.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 680ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 30 Jul 2025 – 31 Jul 2025
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- freguesias
- Started on
- 30 Jul
- 2025
- Heat detections
- 38
- in a single hotspot: 179 MW
- Danger at start
- 28
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 794MW
- detected power per day, on average
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 9 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
36% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 188 ha in 2016, 39 ha in 2017, 1 ha in 2021, 101 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 242 ha that had burned before.
- 151 ha Recarei fire, August 2016 359 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 84 ha Sobreira fire, August 2022 142 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 5 ha Sobreira fire, August 2016 211 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Lisbon boundary: geoBoundaries · geoBoundaries, DG Territory (CC0 1.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Aguiar de Sousa 1,582 inhabitants · fire reached the centre449 ha reached on 30 Jul20 %
-
211 ha reached on 30 Jul14 %
-
Sobreira 4,124 inhabitants · 2.4 km from the centre21 ha1.0 %
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
- Scrub and transitional woodland85 %
- Broadleaved forest7.6 %
- Mixed forest3.5 %
- Artificial surfaces2.5 %
- Agricultural areas1.2 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 57 %
- LIC Valongo PTCON0024
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.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there were about 2.4 hectares of built-up land and about 100 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
Official record
According to ICNF, this fire started on 30 July 2025 and burned 660 ha (the satellite measured 680 ha).
- Paredes Recarei 30 July 2025 · 10:47 660 ha · extinguished on 1 August 2025 · cause: unknown
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30 Jul | 32.5 °C | 36 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 31 Jul | 32.7 °C | 35 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 27 |
| 1 Aug after | 31.1 °C | 43 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 2 Aug after | 32.4 °C | 45 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 3 Aug after | 35.2 °C | 33 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 4 Aug after | 33.4 °C | 39 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 5 Aug after | 35.5 °C | 34 % | 25 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 6 Aug after | 28.5 °C | 54 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 21 |
| 7 Aug after | 26.9 °C | 61 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 8 Aug after | 26.9 °C | 64 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 9 Aug after | 29.6 °C | 64 % | 24 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 10 Aug after | 29.9 °C | 49 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
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 1 August 2025 the air beside the fire reached 96 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 39: 2.6 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 · 38Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 4,706 haAguiar de SousaSeptember 2024 · 4 days · 9 km away
- 8,253 haChaveOctober 2017 · 2 days · 20 km away
- 6,555 haArouca RealJuly 2025 · 5 days · 24 km away
- 30,331 haArouca Santa EuláliaAugust 2016 · 9 days · 32 km away
- 6,845 haUnião das Freguesias de Campelo e Ovil e Loivos do MonteSeptember 2024 · 3 days · 34 km away
- 2,682 haCelorico de Basto Codeçoso14 September 2024 · 6 days · 37 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Paredes fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 30 July 2025 and 31 July 2025: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 30 July 2025 at 10:47 and declared extinguished on 1 August 2025.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 680 hectares (6.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Aguiar de Sousa (449 ha, 20 %); Recarei (211 ha, 14 %); Sobreira (21 ha, 1.0 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire reached the centre of Aguiar de Sousa: the point marking it was inside the burnt area or less than 500 metres from it. That does not mean houses burned.
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 32.7 °C, humidity dropped to 35 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 28, class 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
- ICNF · Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas ↗
- ANEPC · Proteção Civil ↗
- Fogos.pt (ocorrências em tempo real) ↗
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes 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
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 38 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with ICNF: 660 official ha against 680 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.