The fire started on 12 September 2020 in Portela e Extremo, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 114 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single freguesia. According to ICNF, it was detected on 12 September 2020 at 22:18 and declared extinguished on 13 September 2020.
It is the 24th largest in Arcos de Valdevez since 2016 (of 29 with a page). Number 63 in Portugal in 2020, of 67.
The power measured by the satellite is low (11.2 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Perimeter published by EFFIS (Copernicus).
ICNF: 113 ha (matched records: 1). Difference between the page and the official record: +1.0%. Matched on 1 November 2026.
12 Sept 2020 to 13 Sept 2020: first and last day with fire on the page.
ICNF declared the fire extinguished on 13 September 2020. Satellites may still see smouldering spots afterwards.
Alert according to ICNF: 12 September 2020 at 22:18. Official cause: negligence.
First day with fire on the page (satellite or perimeter): 12 September 2020.
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 11 MW.
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
Total radiative power on 13 September 2020; hotspots that day: 8.
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 21.
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
High of 31.8 °C and minimum humidity of 28% on 12 September 2020; gusts of 36 km/h on 13 September 2020.
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-09-12 | 0 | 0 | 31.8 | 15.1 | 28 | 11.2 | 21.6 | 0 | 21.6 | alto | 1 |
| 2020-09-13 | 8 | 50 | 31 | 18 | 28 | 12.2 | 36 | 0.1 | 22.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2020-09-14 | 0 | 0 | 22.8 | 16.1 | 60 | 13.8 | 45.7 | 4 | 2.8 | muy_bajo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: EFFIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ICNF, ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
13 Sept 2020 · 50 MW · 8
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
It had gone 21 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.0 mm on 14 Sept.
70% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 80 ha in 2016.
Burnt area inside each freguesia, 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.
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
According to ICNF, this fire started on 12 September 2020 and burned 113 ha (the satellite measured 114 ha).
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.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12 Sept | 31.8 °C | 28 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 13 Sept | 31.0 °C | 28 % | 36 km/h | 0.1 mm | High 23 |
| 14 Sept after | 22.8 °C | 60 % | 46 km/h | 4.0 mm | Very low 3 |
It started with an FWI of 21.6, a minimum humidity of 28% and 21 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 36.
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 16.3 mm on 11 Oct.
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 4.2 mm on 11 Oct.
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 21.6 mm on 16 Oct.
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 15.9 mm on 16 Oct.
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 16.4 mm on 16 Oct.
It stayed below its twins: 114 ha against a median of 369 ha. It lasted 2 days, against 2 days.
In 8 of 36, 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 14.3 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
It was considered over on 13 Sept, and on 14 Sept 4.0 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 28 of 36, with a median of 14.3 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
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.
On 13 September 2020 the air beside the fire reached 28 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.1 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)
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
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
No changes since 24 October 2026.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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.
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. Freguesia boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM3 (CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication). The area per freguesia is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.