How long did the Troia fire last?

According to the heat detections seen by satellite, it burned from 16 October 2026 to 20 October 2026 (5 days between the first and the last detection). There is no perimeter yet to date it.

How much area did it burn?

There is no official perimeter yet. Heat detections rebuild about 252 hectares with fire (2.5 km²); Copernicus will publish the measured figure within days.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 20 municipalities: Lucera (56 ha, 0.2 %); Torremaggiore (28 ha, 0.1 %); Tufara (28 ha, 0.8 %); San Paolo di Civitate (28 ha, 0.3 %); Biccari (28 ha, 0.3 %); Castelnuovo della Daunia (14 ha, 0.2 %); Colletorto (14 ha, 0.4 %); Pietramontecorvino (14 ha, 0.2 %); San Giuliano di Puglia (14 ha, 0.3 %); Volturino (14 ha, 0.2 %); Troia (14 ha, 0.1 %); Santa Croce di Magliano (0 ha, 0.0 %).

Is the Troia fire still active?

No fire detections since 20 Oct 2026, 13:04 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.

Did the fire reach a town?

The fire came within 1.1 km of the centre of Casalvecchio di Puglia, the closest of the areas it touched. 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 23.0 °C, humidity dropped to 37 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.

Where does this data come from?

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

IT · Italy · 2026-10-16 → 2026-10-20

Troia fire, October 2026 Lucera, Torremaggiore, Tufara

Out · last detection 20 Oct 2026, 13:04 UTC

Satellites first detected fire on 16 October 2026 in Troia, Italy. It was active for 5 days, with 21 heat detections and an area with fire of about 252 hectares rebuilt from them, spread across 20 municipalities.

The power measured by the satellite is low (13.6 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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Copernicus has not yet published the burnt perimeter, which takes a few days to measure on satellite imagery. For now the area is the one rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per pixel). When the perimeter arrives, this page picks it up on its own and keeps the same address.

Area with fire: ≈ 252ha; rebuilt from hotspots, no official perimeter yet
Duration: 5days; 16 Oct 2026 – 20 Oct 2026
Municipalities hit: 20; municipalities
Started on: 16 Oct; 2026
Heat detections: 21; in a single hotspot: 14 MW
Danger at start: 9; Low · FWI index
Average daily power: 26MW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 16 Oct20 Oct

Play back 20 Oct 2026

How it evolved, day by day

16 Oct 17 Oct 18 Oct 19 Oct 20 Oct

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

The weather it burned in

23°high

45km/h · peak gust

37%lowest humidity

It had gone 2 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 12.2 mm on 21 Oct.

What happened to each town

Lucera 30,975 inhabitants · 7.3 km from the centre

56 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.2 %
Torremaggiore 16,514 inhabitants · 2.4 km from the centre

28 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.1 %
Tufara 793 inhabitants · 2.5 km from the centre

28 ha reached on 17 Oct

0.8 %
San Paolo di Civitate 5,460 inhabitants · 2.8 km from the centre

28 ha reached on 20 Oct

0.3 %
Biccari 2,636 inhabitants · 3.4 km from the centre

28 ha reached on 16 Oct

0.3 %
Castelnuovo della Daunia

14 ha reached on 17 Oct

0.2 %
Colletorto 982 inhabitants · 4.6 km from the centre

14 ha reached on 19 Oct

0.4 %
Pietramontecorvino 2,352 inhabitants

14 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.2 %
San Giuliano di Puglia

14 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.3 %
Volturino 1,554 inhabitants · 2.6 km from the centre

14 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.2 %
Troia 6,689 inhabitants · 2.6 km from the centre where it started

14 ha reached on 16 Oct

0.1 %
Santa Croce di Magliano 3,960 inhabitants · 2.1 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 19 Oct

0.0 %
Bovino 2,973 inhabitants · 7.2 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 19 Oct

0.0 %
Carlantino 804 inhabitants · 2.1 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 19 Oct

0.0 %
Casalvecchio di Puglia 1,271 inhabitants · 1.1 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.0 %
Castelvetere in Val Fortore 986 inhabitants · 3.7 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 19 Oct

0.0 %
Orsara di Puglia 2,507 inhabitants · 5.9 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.0 %
Alberona 846 inhabitants · 4.6 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.0 %
Celenza Valfortore 1,363 inhabitants · 1.6 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.0 %
Casalnuovo Monterotaro 1,357 inhabitants · 1.9 km from the centre

0 ha reached on 18 Oct

0.0 %

Area with fire inside each municipality, rebuilt from heat detections (about 14 hectares per VIIRS pixel). An estimate until the official perimeter arrives. 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.

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)
16 Oct	21.3 °C	51 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 9
17 Oct	20.6 °C	41 %	21 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 7
18 Oct	21.1 °C	37 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 8
19 Oct	21.4 °C	42 %	23 km/h	0.0 mm	Low 8
20 Oct	23.0 °C	48 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	Moderate 12
21 Oct after	23.3 °C	72 %	53 km/h	12.2 mm	Very low 0

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 9 Oct 2026

After · 24 Oct 2026

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 20 October 2026 the air beside the fire reached 13 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak13 µg/m³

Days over the guideline0 days

PM1017 µg/m³

Optical depth0.31

1415161718192021

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 · 21Every 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 Italy ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Troia fire last?: According to the heat detections seen by satellite, it burned from 16 October 2026 to 20 October 2026 (5 days between the first and the last detection). There is no perimeter yet to date it.
How much area did it burn?: There is no official perimeter yet. Heat detections rebuild about 252 hectares with fire (2.5 km²); Copernicus will publish the measured figure within days.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 20 municipalities: Lucera (56 ha, 0.2 %); Torremaggiore (28 ha, 0.1 %); Tufara (28 ha, 0.8 %); San Paolo di Civitate (28 ha, 0.3 %); Biccari (28 ha, 0.3 %); Castelnuovo della Daunia (14 ha, 0.2 %); Colletorto (14 ha, 0.4 %); Pietramontecorvino (14 ha, 0.2 %); San Giuliano di Puglia (14 ha, 0.3 %); Volturino (14 ha, 0.2 %); Troia (14 ha, 0.1 %); Santa Croce di Magliano (0 ha, 0.0 %).
Is the Troia fire still active?: No fire detections since 20 Oct 2026, 13:04 UTC. A lack of detections is not an official extinction.
Did the fire reach a town?: The fire came within 1.1 km of the centre of Casalvecchio di Puglia, the closest of the areas it touched. 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 23.0 °C, humidity dropped to 37 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 12, class Moderate.
Where does this data come from?: From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Italy (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 · 1515 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

Protezione Civile ↗
Carabinieri Forestali (1515) ↗

Satellite cross-check

NASA FIRMS ↗
EFFIS · Copernicus ↗

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.

RSS Changes to this page

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?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

Your connection to the fire (optional) Email (optional)

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 · 1515.

How we know this

No perimeter yet: the area (≈ 252 ha) is estimated by counting VIIRS pixels with fire, about 14 ha each.
Dates of the first and last VIIRS detection of the cluster. 21 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.

How we build fire pages: methodology ›

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 ADM4 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License). 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