How long did the Pombal fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 October 2017 to 9 October 2017 (4 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 October 2017 to 8 October 2017.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,547 hectares (15.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais (1,232 ha, 19 %); Abiul (315 ha, 5.8 %); Vila Cã (2 ha, 0.1 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.9 km of Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais. 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 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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.

PT · Portugal · 2017-10-06 → 2017-10-09

Pombal fire, October 2017 Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais, Abiul, Vila Cã

Out · last detection 9 Oct 2017, 01:47 UTC

The fire started on 6 October 2017 in Abiul, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,547 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

Number 42 in Portugal in 2017, of 210.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Ansião · 2022 Leiria · 2022 Pedrógão Grande · 2017 Ferreira do Zêzere · 2017

Burnt area: 1,547ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 4days; 6 Oct 2017 – 9 Oct 2017
Municipalities hit: 3; freguesias
Started on: 6 Oct; 2017
Heat detections: 56; in a single hotspot: 157 MW
Danger at start: 36; High · FWI index
Average daily power: 132MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Oct9 Oct

Play back 9 Oct 2017

How it evolved, day by day

6 Oct 7 Oct 9 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

31°high

36km/h · peak gust

16%lowest humidity

It had gone 37 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 9.4 mm on 16 Oct.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 1% of the area of London (15 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

Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais 3,226 inhabitants · 1.9 km from the town

1,232 ha reached on 7 Oct

19 %
Abiul 2,236 inhabitants · 3.5 km from the town where it started

315 ha reached on 6 Oct

5.8 %
Vila Cã 1,401 inhabitants · 4.7 km from the town

2 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

Broadleaved forest53 %
Scrub and transitional woodland38 %
Agricultural areas3.9 %
Coniferous forest3.4 %
Artificial surfaces2.3 %

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

Official record

Several official records match this area

According to ICNF, 2 fires started inside this perimeter on these dates, totalling 2,360 ha (the satellite measured 1,547 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

ICNF records each fire that started at a different time or place separately; the satellite sees a single burned area, so this page groups them together. The numbers on the map show where each one started.

When each one burned

1 1,354 ha 2 1,006 ha

6 Oct9 Oct

arson cause unknown or not published

1 Pombal Abiul 6 October 2017 · 14:14 1,354 ha · extinguished on 7 October 2017 · cause: arson
2 Ourém Freixianda 8 October 2017 · 17:08 1,006 ha · extinguished on 9 October 2017

Total according to ICNF: 2,360 ha, 153 % of the 1,547 ha in the satellite perimeter.

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)
6 Oct	30.8 °C	24 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
7 Oct	30.6 °C	18 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
8 Oct	29.8 °C	16 %	29 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
9 Oct	28.5 °C	24 %	26 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
10 Oct after	29.1 °C	20 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 38
11 Oct after	28.6 °C	21 %	27 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 39
12 Oct after	27.9 °C	22 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 46
13 Oct after	25.1 °C	45 %	22 km/h	0.0 mm	High 27
14 Oct after	30.6 °C	26 %	36 km/h	0.0 mm	High 37
15 Oct after	33.2 °C	17 %	56 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 59
16 Oct after	24.4 °C	52 %	46 km/h	9.4 mm	Very low 5

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 29 Sept 2017

After · 16 Oct 2017

Before After

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 October 2017 the air beside the fire reached 49 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 31: 2.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak49 µg/m³

Days over the guideline7 days

PM1059 µg/m³

WHO 15

456789101112

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 · 56Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Pombal fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 October 2017 to 9 October 2017 (4 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 October 2017 to 8 October 2017.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,547 hectares (15.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais (1,232 ha, 19 %); Abiul (315 ha, 5.8 %); Vila Cã (2 ha, 0.1 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.9 km of Freixianda, Ribeira do Fárrio e Formigais. 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 30.8 °C, humidity dropped to 16 % and gusts hit 36 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

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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.

How we know this

Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 6 October 2017 to 8 October 2017. 56 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
Compared with ICNF: 2,360 official ha against 1,547 ha of perimeter; similar, but with reservations.
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 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.

Where it burned