Vilia fire, August 2021 Βίλια · Mandra-Eidyllia, Megara
The fire started on 16 August 2021 in Mandra-Eidyllia, Greece, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 10,175 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 4th largest in Attica since 2016 (of 32 with a page). Number 4 in Greece in 2021, of 45.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 10,175ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 8days
- 16 Aug 2021 – 23 Aug 2021
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 16 Aug
- 2021
- Heat detections
- 551
- in a single hotspot: 397 MW
- Danger at start
- 54
- Extreme · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 2.7GW
- 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 41 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
1% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 57 ha in 2016.
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Athens boundary: geoBoundaries · geoBoundaries, Wikimedia Commons (CC0 1.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
8,768 ha reached on 16 Aug21 %
-
1,422 ha reached on 17 Aug4.4 %
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
- Sclerophyllous scrub49 %
- Coniferous forest19 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland17 %
- Mixed forest7.4 %
- Agricultural areas4.7 %
- Other natural land3.3 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
Checked against the press
Checked on 30 September 2026We checked this page against 4 sources published once the fire was out. This is what they add:
- Also known as
- Vilia fire · Mandra-Vilia · Φωτιά στα Βίλια
- Official area reported: 9,432 ha (the satellite measured 10,175 ha)
Sources
- The map of destruction in Western Attica: More than 48,000 hectares burned in 9 years — ProtoThema English, 3 August 2026
- Θλιβερός απολογισμός από τις φωτιές: Πάνω από 94.000 στρέμματα καμένα στα Βίλια — Alfavita, 22 August 2021
- Οριοθετημένη στο μεγαλύτερο μέρος της η φωτιά στα Βίλια — Cretalive, 19 August 2021
- Vilia, West Attica: Fire is raging out of control for 4th consecutive day — Keep Talking Greece, 19 August 2021
Official figures are measured differently from satellite ones and sometimes cover only part of the fire.
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 Aug | 31.2 °C | 25 % | 53 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 54 |
| 17 Aug | 34.4 °C | 15 % | 35 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 50 |
| 18 Aug | 33.9 °C | 27 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 19 Aug | 31.9 °C | 35 % | 42 km/h | 1.0 mm | High 27 |
| 20 Aug | 31.1 °C | 30 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 21 Aug | 30.1 °C | 27 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 22 Aug | 28.9 °C | 29 % | 65 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 58 |
| 23 Aug | 28.6 °C | 35 % | 66 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 59 |
| 24 Aug after | 30.1 °C | 26 % | 60 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 53 |
| 25 Aug after | 32.8 °C | 21 % | 41 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 26 Aug after | 34.8 °C | 19 % | 37 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 27 Aug after | 34.1 °C | 26 % | 43 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 47 |
| 28 Aug after | 32.5 °C | 25 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 29 Aug after | 32.2 °C | 25 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 42 |
| 30 Aug after | 32.1 °C | 21 % | 42 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 40 |
| 31 Aug after | 31.1 °C | 27 % | 31 km/h | 0.2 mm | High 34 |
| 1 Sept after | 30.6 °C | 26 % | 32 km/h | 0.4 mm | High 36 |
| 2 Sept after | 28.0 °C | 33 % | 55 km/h | 0.1 mm | Very high 43 |
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 18 August 2021 the air beside the fire reached 86 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 37: 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 · 551Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 13,192 haMandra-Eidyllia Μάνδρας - Ειδυλλίας31 July 2026 · 6 days · 8 km away
- 11,662 haDervenochoria Μάνδρας - ΕιδυλλίαςJuly 2023 · 7 days · 12 km away
- 7,005 haGerania Λουτρακίου - Περαχώρας - Αγίων ΘεοδώρωνMay 2021 · 5 days · 19 km away
- 5,568 haKineta ΜέγαραJuly 2018 · 3 days · 20 km away
- 6,057 haAspropyrgos ΑσπρόπυργοςAugust 2023 · 7 days · 27 km away
- 3,735 haThebes ΘηβαίωνJuly 2026 · 2 days · 31 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Vilia fire last?
- Copernicus dates it between 16 August 2021 and 23 August 2021: 8 days between the first and last image with fire.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 10,175 hectares (101.8 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Mandra-Eidyllia (8,768 ha, 21 %); Megara (1,422 ha, 4.4 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The fire started in Mandra-Eidyllia and came within 6.3 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 34.4 °C, humidity dropped to 15 % and gusts hit 66 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 59, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Greece (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 · 199 · Emergency number and official warnings ›
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.
Report an error
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 551 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Checked against news and agencies: 4 confirmed sources.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
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.