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Rianxo fire, 26 March 2019 Rianxo, Dodro

Out · last detection 26 Mar 2019, 13:16 UTC

The fire started on 26 March 2019 in Rianxo, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 682 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 4th largest in A Coruña since 2016 (of 20 with a page). Number 17 in Spain in 2019, of 102.

Burnt area
682ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
26 Mar 2019 – 26 Mar 2019
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
26 Mar
2019
Heat detections
50
in a single hotspot: 32 MW
Danger at start
10
Low · FWI index
Energy released
440MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 26 Mar26 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

26

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

The weather it burned in

22°high
53km/h · peak gust
36%lowest humidity

It had gone 8 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.9 mm on 3 Apr.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Rianxo 10,758 inhabitants · 4.9 km from the town where it started
    602 ha reached on 26 Mar
    10 %
  2. Dodro 2,589 inhabitants · 3.4 km from the town
    81 ha reached on 26 Mar
    2.2 %

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

  • Broadleaved forest41 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland29 %
  • Coniferous forest18 %
  • Other natural land12 %
  • Agricultural areas0.6 %

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

Official record

According to EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 25 March 2019 and burned 1,193 ha (the satellite measured 682 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

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.

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)
26 Mar 21.7 °C 36 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
27 Mar after 22.6 °C 27 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
28 Mar after 22.9 °C 35 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Low 9
29 Mar after 21.1 °C 39 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Low 10
30 Mar after 19.5 °C 41 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
31 Mar after 20.6 °C 46 % 29 km/h 0.7 mm Low 6
1 Apr after 20.9 °C 48 % 26 km/h 0.3 mm Low 6
2 Apr after 15.5 °C 57 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Low 8
3 Apr after 12.4 °C 60 % 55 km/h 1.9 mm Very low 3

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 19 Mar 2019
After · 2 Apr 2019

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 25 March 2019 the air beside the fire reached 23 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 17: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak23 µg/m³
Days over the guideline3 days
PM1036 µg/m³
242526272829
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 · 50Every 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 timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Spain ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Rianxo fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 26 March 2019 and 26 March 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 682 hectares (6.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Rianxo (602 ha, 10 %); Dodro (81 ha, 2.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.4 km of Dodro. 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 21.7 °C, humidity dropped to 36 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 10, class Low.
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

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
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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.

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.