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Samos fire, September 2018 Δυτικής Σάμου · Samos

Out · last detection 10 Sept 2018, 00:06 UTC

The fire started on 9 September 2018 in Samos, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 147 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

We are reviewing this page: some of its data look inconsistent (the place, the dates or the area), so treat them with caution.

Burnt area
147ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
9 Sept 2018 – 10 Sept 2018
Municipalities hit
1
municipalities
Started on
9 Sept
2018
Heat detections
12
in a single hotspot: 44 MW
Danger at start
33
High · FWI index
Energy released
219MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Sept 2018
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Sept10 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

910

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

The weather it burned in

29°high
50km/h · peak gust
44%lowest humidity

It had gone 34 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Samos Δυτικής Σάμου where it started
    18 ha reached on 9 Sept
    0.0 %

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

  • Scrub and transitional woodland42 %
  • Agricultural areas35 %
  • Mixed forest21 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub2.0 %

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)
9 Sept 29.0 °C 46 % 50 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Sept 28.1 °C 44 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
11 Sept after 27.2 °C 42 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
12 Sept after 28.9 °C 37 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Sept after 26.6 °C 45 % 35 km/h 0.8 mm High 26
14 Sept after 25.4 °C 62 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 22
15 Sept after 27.1 °C 53 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
16 Sept after 29.5 °C 41 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Sept after 29.9 °C 39 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
18 Sept after 28.8 °C 43 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
19 Sept after 28.2 °C 47 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
20 Sept after 27.8 °C 53 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 28

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Sept 2018
After · 17 Sept 2018

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 9 September 2018 the air beside the fire reached 22 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 17: 1.2 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak22 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1030 µg/m³
78910111213
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 · 12Every 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 Greece ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Samos fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 9 September 2018 and 10 September 2018: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 147 hectares (1.5 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Samos (18 ha, 0.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.0 °C, humidity dropped to 44 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 33, 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.