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Tomar fire, September 2019 Sabacheira

Out · last measured on 3 Sept 2019

The fire started on 3 September 2019 in Sabacheira, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 1 day. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 145 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.

Number 36 in Portugal in 2019, of 52.

We have the Copernicus perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
145ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
1day
3 Sept 2019 – 3 Sept 2019
Municipalities hit
1
freguesias
Started on
3 Sept
2019
Danger at start
32
High · FWI index
Natura 2000
18%
of the perimeter is protected land

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

34°high
37km/h · peak gust
29%lowest humidity

It had gone 7 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. Sabacheira 844 inhabitants · 2.1 km from the town where it started
    145 ha
    4.2 %

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

  • Sclerophyllous scrub91 %
  • Agricultural areas6.8 %
  • Scrub and transitional woodland2.0 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 18 %

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.

Official record

According to ICNF, this fire started on 2 September 2019 and burned 196 ha (the satellite measured 145 ha). The two figures differ a lot, so these may not be exactly the same fire: take them as nearby records.

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)
3 Sept 34.0 °C 29 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Sept after 32.1 °C 30 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
5 Sept after 34.1 °C 23 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
6 Sept after 31.1 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
7 Sept after 31.7 °C 21 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
8 Sept after 31.9 °C 23 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 38
9 Sept after 23.5 °C 50 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
10 Sept after 23.0 °C 36 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
11 Sept after 28.5 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
12 Sept after 32.7 °C 24 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Sept after 33.7 °C 21 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Aug 2019
After · 10 Sept 2019

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 4 September 2019 the air beside the fire reached 20 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak20 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1029 µg/m³
123456
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)

Other fires nearby

All fires in Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Tomar fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 3 September 2019 and 3 September 2019: 1 day between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 145 hectares (1.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Sabacheira (145 ha, 4.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 2.1 km of Sabacheira. 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 34.0 °C, humidity dropped to 29 % and gusts hit 37 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, 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.

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.

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.