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Tangil fire, September 2016 Gave, Parada do Monte e Cubalhão, Riba de Mouro

Out · last detection 9 Sept 2016, 13:16 UTC

The fire started on 6 September 2016 in Tangil, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 868 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 5 municipalities.

It is the 2th largest in Monção since 2016 (of 10 with a page). Number 37 in Portugal in 2016, of 179.

Burnt area
868ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
4days
6 Sept 2016 – 9 Sept 2016
Municipalities hit
5
freguesias
Started on
6 Sept
2016
Heat detections
62
in a single hotspot: 42 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
941MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

9 Sept 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Sept9 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

6789

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

The weather it burned in

32°high
45km/h · peak gust
25%lowest humidity

It had gone 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 43.2 mm on 13 Sept.

This area had burned before

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

What happened to each town

  1. Gave 180 inhabitants · 1.8 km from the town
    523 ha reached on 7 Sept
    28 %
  2. Parada do Monte e Cubalhão 477 inhabitants · 3.1 km from the town
    196 ha reached on 7 Sept
    6.6 %
  3. Riba de Mouro 802 inhabitants · 3.2 km from the town
    98 ha reached on 6 Sept
    6.9 %
  4. Gavieira 258 inhabitants · 4.0 km from the town
    43 ha
    0.7 %
  5. Tangil 629 inhabitants · 5.8 km from the town where it started
    9 ha reached on 6 Sept
    0.4 %

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

  • Other natural land69 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland27 %
  • Broadleaved forest3.3 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 0 %

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)
6 Sept 31.6 °C 25 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
7 Sept 24.2 °C 41 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
8 Sept 20.1 °C 44 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 19
9 Sept 20.5 °C 37 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 18
10 Sept after 20.1 °C 58 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 14
11 Sept after 22.3 °C 50 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 13
12 Sept after 22.8 °C 47 % 52 km/h 0.0 mm Moderate 16
13 Sept after 14.9 °C 68 % 65 km/h 43.2 mm Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 30 Aug 2016
After · 16 Sept 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 62Every 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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tangil fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 6 September 2016 and 9 September 2016: 4 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 868 hectares (8.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 5 municipalities: Gave (523 ha, 28 %); Parada do Monte e Cubalhão (196 ha, 6.6 %); Riba de Mouro (98 ha, 6.9 %); Gavieira (43 ha, 0.7 %); Tangil (9 ha, 0.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 1.8 km of Gave. 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 31.6 °C, humidity dropped to 25 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 24, class High.
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

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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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.