Pazos de Borbén fire, October 2017 Ponte Caldelas, Pazos de Borbén, Cerdedo-Cotobade
The fire started on 15 October 2017 in Pazos de Borbén, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 8,722 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 8 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 15 October 2017 at 00:26 and declared extinguished on 19 October 2017.
It is the largest fire in Pontevedra since 2016 (of 33 with a page). Number 3 in Spain in 2017, of 144.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 8,722ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 1day
- 15 Oct 2017 – 15 Oct 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 8
- municipalities
- Started on
- 15 Oct
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 237
- in a single hotspot: 122 MW
- Danger at start
- 24
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 3.1GW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
15 Oct 2017 · 3,136 MW · 237
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 20 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 25.2 mm on 16 Oct.
This area had burned before
0% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 32 ha in 2016.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
Ponte Caldelas 5,609 inhabitants · fire reached the centre2,722 ha31 %
-
2,629 ha reached on 15 Oct52 %
-
Cerdedo-Cotobade 5,671 inhabitants · 1.6 km from the centre838 ha3.9 %
-
Ponteareas 23,211 inhabitants · 6.7 km from the centre787 ha reached on 15 Oct6.3 %
-
Soutomaior 7,589 inhabitants · 1.7 km from the centre700 ha28 %
-
Redondela 28,874 inhabitants · 1.6 km from the centre424 ha8.1 %
-
Fornelos de Montes 1,614 inhabitants · 3.4 km from the centre371 ha reached on 15 Oct4.7 %
-
Mos 15,233 inhabitants · 4.8 km from the centre256 ha reached on 15 Oct4.8 %
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
- Broadleaved forest39 %
- Other natural land33 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland11 %
- Mixed forest6.3 %
- Agricultural areas6.3 %
- Coniferous forest3.0 %
- Artificial surfaces0.8 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2015Inside the perimeter there were about 40 hectares of built-up land and about 2,000 residents (GHSL 2015, 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.
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 EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 15 October 2017 and burned 8,729 ha (the satellite measured 8,722 ha).
- Ponteareas 15 October 2017 · 00:26 8,729 ha · extinguished on 19 October 2017 · cause: arson
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.
Checked against the press
Checked on 30 September 2026We checked this page against 3 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:
- Also known as
- incendio de Ponteareas · incendio de Padróns · incendio de Pazos de Borbén
Sources
- El mayor incendio arrasa Pazos de Borbén tras partir de Ponteareas — Atlántico Diario, 16 October 2017
- Arde sobre quemado: los grandes incendios forestales tienen memoria — elDiario.es Galicia
- El 80% de las 62.000 hectáreas arrasadas por los incendios de 2017 en Galicia ardieron en dos días de octubre — elDiario.es Galicia
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Oct | 31.8 °C | 29 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 16 Oct after | 25.4 °C | 40 % | 55 km/h | 25.2 mm | Very low 2 |
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.
Detections table · 237Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 3,333 haAs NevesOctober 2017 · 1 day · 26 km away
- 3,096 haCarballeda de AviaAugust 2025 · 5 days · 27 km away
- 1,734 haGondomar15 October 2017 · 1 day · 27 km away
- 1,213 haGondomar15 October 2017 · 1 day · 27 km away
- 2,146 haArbo10 August 2016 · 3 days · 28 km away
- 3,893 haMonção MerufeOctober 2017 · 2 days · 35 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Pazos de Borbén fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 15 October 2017 and 15 October 2017: 1 day between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 15 October 2017 at 00:26 and declared extinguished on 19 October 2017.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 8,722 hectares (87.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 8 municipalities: Ponte Caldelas (2,722 ha, 31 %); Pazos de Borbén (2,629 ha, 52 %); Cerdedo-Cotobade (838 ha, 3.9 %); Ponteareas (787 ha, 6.3 %); Soutomaior (700 ha, 28 %); Redondela (424 ha, 8.1 %); Fornelos de Montes (371 ha, 4.7 %); Mos (256 ha, 4.8 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Pazos de Borbén and reached its centre: 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 31.8 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 24, 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 · 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.
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. 237 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- Compared with EGIF (MITECO): 8,729 official ha against 8,722 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
- Checked against news and agencies: 3 confirmed sources.
- 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 2015, 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 (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.