Skip to content
worldfires
PT · Portugal · →

Vila Real fire, August 2017 Borbela e Lamas de Olo, Adoufe e Vilarinho de Samardã, Lordelo

Out · last detection 10 Aug 2017, 02:12 UTC

The fire started on 9 August 2017 in Borbela e Lamas de Olo, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 770 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities.

Number 71 in Portugal in 2017, of 210.

The power measured by the satellite is low (21.7 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.

Burnt area
770ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
9 Aug 2017 – 10 Aug 2017
Municipalities hit
3
freguesias
Started on
9 Aug
2017
Heat detections
35
in a single hotspot: 22 MW
Danger at start
26
High · FWI index
Energy released
210MW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 9 Aug10 Aug

How it evolved, day by day

10

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
63km/h · peak gust
26%lowest humidity

It had gone 20 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. Borbela e Lamas de Olo 2,890 inhabitants · 1.0 km from the town where it started
    416 ha reached on 10 Aug
    10 %
  2. Adoufe e Vilarinho de Samardã 2,658 inhabitants · 2.2 km from the town
    320 ha reached on 10 Aug
    8.4 %
  3. Lordelo 0.6 km from the town
    34 ha reached on 10 Aug
    6.4 %

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

  • Scrub and transitional woodland46 %
  • Agricultural areas23 %
  • Other natural land16 %
  • Coniferous forest12 %
  • Mixed forest3.0 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 17 %

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 9 August 2017 and burned 560 ha (the satellite measured 770 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)
9 Aug 19.8 °C 31 % 63 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
10 Aug 23.2 °C 26 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
11 Aug after 26.2 °C 23 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
12 Aug after 28.2 °C 25 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
13 Aug after 29.8 °C 22 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
14 Aug after 27.4 °C 28 % 46 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
15 Aug after 23.4 °C 41 % 53 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
16 Aug after 25.4 °C 29 % 48 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
17 Aug after 28.2 °C 33 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
18 Aug after 26.9 °C 38 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm High 27
19 Aug after 28.8 °C 21 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
20 Aug after 31.4 °C 18 % 57 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 2 Aug 2017
After · 17 Aug 2017

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 2017 the air beside the fire reached 18 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak18 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1026 µg/m³
78910111213
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 · 35Every 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 Vila Real fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 9 August 2017 and 10 August 2017: 2 days between the first and last image with fire.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 770 hectares (7.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Borbela e Lamas de Olo (416 ha, 10 %); Adoufe e Vilarinho de Samardã (320 ha, 8.4 %); Lordelo (34 ha, 6.4 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The closest fire to a town centre came within 0.6 km of Lordelo. 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 23.2 °C, humidity dropped to 26 % and gusts hit 63 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 29, 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.