Salemi fire, August 2023 Salemi, Trapani, Calatafimi-Segesta
The fire started on 27 August 2023 in Salemi, Italy, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,567 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 4th largest in Trapani since 2016 (of 68 with a page). Number 9 in Italy in 2023, of 207.
- Burnt area
- 1,567ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 2days
- 27 Aug 2023 – 28 Aug 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 27 Aug
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 73
- in a single hotspot: 117 MW
- Danger at start
- 50
- Extreme · FWI index
- Energy released
- 946MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
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 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 2.7 mm on 7 Sept.
This area had burned before
37% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 176 ha in 2016, 48 ha in 2017, 167 ha in 2019, 152 ha in 2020, 7 ha in 2021, 265 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 583 ha that had burned before.
- 257 ha Salemi fire, September 2022 415 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 176 ha Salemi fire, August 2016 182 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 167 ha Salemi fire, August 2019 202 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 115 ha Trapani fire, July 2020 872 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
1,217 ha reached on 27 Aug6.7 %
-
227 ha reached on 28 Aug1.3 %
-
Calatafimi-Segesta 6,127 inhabitants · 3.2 km from the town127 ha reached on 28 Aug0.8 %
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
- Agricultural areas51 %
- Coniferous forest24 %
- Sclerophyllous scrub24 %
Natura 2000 protected area affected: 28 %
- LIC Montagna Grande di Salemi ITA010023
Natura 2000 sites (European Environment Agency, 2024 release) crossed by the perimeter.
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27 Aug | 32.8 °C | 30 % | 60 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 28 Aug | 27.8 °C | 44 % | 62 km/h | 0.2 mm | Very high 40 |
| 29 Aug after | 25.7 °C | 45 % | 65 km/h | 3.4 mm | Moderate 13 |
| 30 Aug after | 25.2 °C | 44 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 31 Aug after | 27.1 °C | 40 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 1 Sept after | 25.9 °C | 42 % | 45 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 2 Sept after | 28.7 °C | 44 % | 39 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 24 |
| 3 Sept after | 29.5 °C | 43 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 4 Sept after | 27.8 °C | 44 % | 58 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 5 Sept after | 25.1 °C | 47 % | 68 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 37 |
| 6 Sept after | 26.2 °C | 46 % | 67 km/h | 0.8 mm | High 29 |
| 7 Sept after | 26.4 °C | 49 % | 54 km/h | 2.7 mm | Low 11 |
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.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 25 August 2023 the air beside the fire reached 23 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 20: 1.3 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)
Detections table · 73Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Salemi fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 27 August 2023 and 28 August 2023: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,567 hectares (15.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Salemi (1,217 ha, 6.7 %); Trapani (227 ha, 1.3 %); Calatafimi-Segesta (127 ha, 0.8 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 3.2 km of Calatafimi-Segesta. 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 32.8 °C, humidity dropped to 30 % and gusts hit 65 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 50, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Italy (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 · 1515
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
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 ADM4 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License). 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.