Skip to content
worldfires
EL · Greece · →

Prespes fire, September 2017 Δημοτική Ενότητα Πρεσπών · Prespes

Out · last measured on 18 Sept 2017

The fire started on 18 September 2017 in Prespes, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 173 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

Number 19 in Greece in 2017, of 32.

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
173ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
18 Sept 2017 – 18 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
18 Sept
2017
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

27°high
37km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.2 mm on 24 Sept.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Prespes Δημοτική Ενότητα Πρεσπών 1,878 inhabitants · 14.8 km from the town where it started
    137 ha
    0.2 %

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

  • Other natural land100 %

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

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)
18 Sept 27.2 °C 19 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
19 Sept after 25.3 °C 19 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
20 Sept after 17.9 °C 42 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
21 Sept after 14.9 °C 43 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
22 Sept after 15.8 °C 31 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
23 Sept after 19.2 °C 31 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
24 Sept after 21.3 °C 29 % 29 km/h 1.2 mm Moderate 12

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 11 Sept 2017
After · 25 Sept 2017

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 19 September 2017 the air beside the fire reached 14 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak14 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1036 µg/m³
161718192021
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Greece ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Prespes fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 18 September 2017 and 18 September 2017: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 173 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Prespes (137 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 14.8 km of Prespes. 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 27.2 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Greece (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 · 199

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 · 199.

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.