Tabua fire, October 2023 Tabua, Ribeira Brava
The fire started on 6 October 2023 in Tabua, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 103 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
Number 38 in Portugal in 2023, of 39.
The power measured by the satellite is low (4.0 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
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- Burnt area
- 103ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 5days
- 6 Oct 2023 – 10 Oct 2023
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- freguesias
- Started on
- 6 Oct
- 2023
- Heat detections
- 6
- in a single hotspot: 4 MW
- Danger at start
- 15
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 9MW
- detected power per day, on average
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 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.5 mm on 16 Oct.
This area had burned before
65% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 67 ha in 2017, 5 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 67 ha that had burned before.
What happened to each town
-
102 ha reached on 6 Oct9.1 %
-
Ribeira Brava 6,233 inhabitants · 3.5 km from the centre1 ha0.1 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
What burned
- Other natural land53 %
- Mixed forest37 %
- Agricultural areas8.6 %
- Broadleaved forest1.0 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 Oct | 25.1 °C | 36 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 15 |
| 7 Oct | 26.2 °C | 26 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 8 Oct | 27.5 °C | 20 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 9 Oct | 25.4 °C | 26 % | 34 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 10 Oct | 26.7 °C | 20 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 11 Oct after | 25.4 °C | 28 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 12 Oct after | 26.1 °C | 24 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 22 |
| 13 Oct after | 25.4 °C | 26 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 23 |
| 14 Oct after | 26.4 °C | 23 % | 22 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 15 Oct after | 24.4 °C | 35 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 16 Oct after | 23.8 °C | 38 % | 80 km/h | 1.5 mm | Moderate 14 |
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 8 October 2023 the air beside the fire reached 45 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 38: 2.5 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 · 6Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 1,025 haTabuaSeptember 2017 · 5 days · 1 km away
- 6,003 haSerra de ÁguaAugust 2024 · 10 days · 4 km away
- 352 haArco da CalhetaOctober 2023 · 2 days · 7 km away
- 3,264 haCanhasAugust 2016 · 6 days · 8 km away
- 2,145 haSão RoqueAugust 2016 · 5 days · 14 km away
- 4,844 haFajã da OvelhaOctober 2023 · 3 days · 18 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Tabua fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 6 October 2023 to 10 October 2023 (5 days). The perimeter dates it from 6 October 2023 to 8 October 2023.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 103 hectares (1.0 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Tabua (102 ha, 9.1 %); Ribeira Brava (1 ha, 0.1 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Tabua and came within 2.9 km of its centre. That is the distance from the perimeter, or the nearest hotspot, to the point marking the centre; it does not mean it entered the houses.
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 27.5 °C, humidity dropped to 20 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 20, class Moderate.
- 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
- ICNF · Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas ↗
- ANEPC · Proteção Civil ↗
- Fogos.pt (ocorrências em tempo real) ↗
Satellite cross-check
History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
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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How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 6 October 2023 to 8 October 2023. 6 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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.