How long did the Senhorim fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 8 August 2016 and 10 August 2016: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,132 hectares (11.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 3 municipalities: Senhorim (784 ha, 25 %); Paranhos (301 ha, 14 %); Girabolhos (49 ha, 2.7 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.5 km of Senhorim. 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 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 59 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.

Where does this data come from?

From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Portugal (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

PT · Portugal · 2016-08-08 → 2016-08-10

Senhorim fire, August 2016 Senhorim, Paranhos, Girabolhos

Out · last detection 10 Aug 2016, 02:56 UTC

The fire started on 8 August 2016 in Senhorim, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 1,132 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

Number 30 in Portugal in 2016, of 179.

Burnt area: 1,132ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 3days; 8 Aug 2016 – 10 Aug 2016
Municipalities hit: 3; freguesias
Started on: 8 Aug; 2016
Heat detections: 55; in a single hotspot: 109 MW
Danger at start: 49; Very high · FWI index
Energy released: 1.8GW; sum of detected power

Play back 10 Aug 2016

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 8 Aug10 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

8910

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

The weather it burned in

37°high

59km/h · peak gust

18%lowest humidity

It had gone 31 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

Senhorim 1,019 inhabitants · 1.5 km from the town where it started

784 ha reached on 8 Aug

25 %
Paranhos 1,265 inhabitants · 1.5 km from the town

301 ha reached on 9 Aug

14 %
Girabolhos 241 inhabitants · 1.9 km from the town

49 ha reached on 9 Aug

2.7 %

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 woodland51 %
Other natural land40 %
Agricultural areas8.2 %

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

Official record

According to ICNF, this fire started on 8 August 2016 and burned 726 ha (the satellite measured 1,132 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

Nelas Senhorim 8 August 2016 · 12:55 726 ha · extinguished on 9 August 2016 · cause: unknown

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.

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)
8 Aug	36.9 °C	18 %	39 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 49
9 Aug	33.6 °C	22 %	50 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
10 Aug	30.2 °C	24 %	59 km/h	0.0 mm	Extreme 54
11 Aug after	31.5 °C	24 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 48
12 Aug after	33.2 °C	22 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 43
13 Aug after	34.5 °C	19 %	31 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 42
14 Aug after	33.1 °C	26 %	28 km/h	0.0 mm	Very high 40
15 Aug after	30.7 °C	33 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 38
16 Aug after	27.7 °C	34 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 34
17 Aug after	25.2 °C	51 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 25
18 Aug after	28.3 °C	31 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
19 Aug after	25.2 °C	61 %	36 km/h	0.2 mm	High 22
20 Aug after	26.1 °C	29 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 1 Aug 2016

After · 17 Aug 2016

Before After

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 13 August 2016 the air beside the fire reached 151 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 66: 4.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak151 µg/m³

Days over the guideline4 days

PM10157 µg/m³

WHO 15

678910111213

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 · 55Every 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 time	Satellite	FRP (MW)	Lat	Lon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Senhorim fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 8 August 2016 and 10 August 2016: 3 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 1,132 hectares (11.3 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 3 municipalities: Senhorim (784 ha, 25 %); Paranhos (301 ha, 14 %); Girabolhos (49 ha, 2.7 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.5 km of Senhorim. 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 36.9 °C, humidity dropped to 18 % and gusts hit 59 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Portugal (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

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

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What really happened?

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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 (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.

Where it burned