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ES · Spain · –

Villarrasa fire, July 2021 Villarrasa, Niebla, La Palma del Condado

Out · last detection 25 Jul 2021, 02:19 UTC

The fire started on 24 July 2021 in Villarrasa, Spain, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 816 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 3 municipalities. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 24 July 2021 at 14:29 and declared extinguished on 28 July 2021.

It is the 13th largest in Huelva since 2016 (of 36 with a page). Number 12 in Spain in 2021, of 120.

Burnt area
816ha
Copernicus perimeter
Duration
2days
24 Jul 2021 – 25 Jul 2021
Municipalities hit
3
municipalities
Started on
24 Jul
2021
Heat detections
19
in a single hotspot: 119 MW
Danger at start
37
High · FWI index
Average daily power
658MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 24 Jul25 Jul
25 Jul 2021

How it evolved, day by day

24 Jul 2021 · 1,311 MW · 16 25 Jul 2021 · 5 MW · 3
24 Jul 25 Jul

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

The weather it burned in

35°high
41km/h · peak gust
17%lowest humidity

It had gone 35 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.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 0.5% of the area of London (8.2 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Villarrasa 4,268 inhabitants · 8.1 km from the centre where it started
    593 ha reached on 24 Jul
    8.2 %
  2. 212 ha reached on 25 Jul
    0.9 %
  3. La Palma del Condado 10,841 inhabitants · 6.2 km from the centre
    13 ha
    0.2 %

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

  • Scrub and transitional woodland59 %
  • Coniferous forest17 %
  • Agricultural areas14 %
  • Sclerophyllous scrub6.5 %
  • Other land cover3.6 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 5 %

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 EGIF (MITECO), this fire started on 24 July 2021 and burned 787 ha (the satellite measured 816 ha).

MITECO, Estadística General de Incendios Forestales (EGIF). This is the agency’s consolidated statistic: it measures the area in its own way, which is why it can differ from the satellite.

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)
24 Jul 34.8 °C 17 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
25 Jul 32.5 °C 36 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
26 Jul after 32.6 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 28
27 Jul after 34.5 °C 32 % 22 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
28 Jul after 35.4 °C 28 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
29 Jul after 34.1 °C 37 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
30 Jul after 34.9 °C 20 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
31 Jul after 29.5 °C 26 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
1 Aug after 30.2 °C 22 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
2 Aug after 31.3 °C 32 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
3 Aug after 33.3 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
4 Aug after 35.2 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 33

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 37.4, a minimum humidity of 17% and 35 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 50.

FWI at the start 37.4
Minimum humidity 17 %
Days without rain 35
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Salorino fire, August 2020
413 ha 1 day FWI 38.7 Min. humidity 17 % 231 km away, in 2020

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

What happened to them

1 day
median duration
316 ha
median area
12 %
went past 1,000 ha
1.4 mm
rain at the end (median; 10 of 50 had it)

It was 2.6 times larger than the median of its twins and lasted 2 days, against 1 day.

Only 11 of its 50 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 40 of 50, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.4 mm.

This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it

How it ended

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
41km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 25 Jul, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 10 of 50, with a median of 1.4 mm.

Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

How a twin is chosen

  • Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
  • Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
  • Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
  • Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
  • They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 17 Jul 2021
After · 1 Aug 2021

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 22 July 2021 the air beside the fire reached 14 µg/m³ of PM2.5, but no daily average passed the WHO guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak14 µg/m³
Days over the guideline0 days
PM1035 µg/m³
22 Jul24 Jul26 Jul28 Jul
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 · 19Every 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 Spain

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Villarrasa fire last?
Copernicus dates it between 24 July 2021 and 25 July 2021: 2 days between the first and last image with fire. According to EGIF (MITECO), it was detected on 24 July 2021 at 14:29 and declared extinguished on 28 July 2021.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 816 hectares (8.2 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 3 municipalities: Villarrasa (593 ha, 8.2 %); Niebla (212 ha, 0.9 %); La Palma del Condado (13 ha, 0.2 %).
Did the fire reach a town?
The fire came within 6.2 km of the centre of La Palma del Condado, 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 34.8 °C, humidity dropped to 17 % and gusts hit 41 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Spain (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 50. Their median duration was 1 day and their median area 316 ha; 12 % went past 1,000 ha. Only 11 of its 50 twins burned more. The weather on the first day does not explain everything: the wind in the following days, the fuel and the firefighting also count. In 40 of 50, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 1.4 mm.

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 · 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.

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.

How we know this
  • Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 19 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
  • Compared with EGIF (MITECO): 787 official ha against 816 ha of perimeter; they agree within 25%.
  • 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 ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). 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.