How long did the Vinhais fire last?

Copernicus dates it between 25 July 2020 and 27 July 2020: 3 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 25 July 2020 at 14:10 and declared extinguished on 26 July 2020.

How much area did it burn?

The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 942 hectares (9.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire entered 4 municipalities: Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil (859 ha, 29 %); Rebordelo (62 ha, 3.0 %); São Vicente (20 ha, 0.6 %); Curopos e Vale de Janeiro (1 ha, 0.0 %).

Did the fire reach a town?

The fire started in Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil and came within 0.7 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 33.5 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very 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.

PT · Portugal · 2020-07-25 → 2020-07-27

Vinhais fire, July 2020 Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil, Rebordelo, São Vicente

Out · last detection 27 Jul 2020, 02:24 UTC

The fire started on 25 July 2020 in Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil, Portugal, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 942 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 4 municipalities. According to ICNF, it was detected on 25 July 2020 at 14:10 and declared extinguished on 26 July 2020.

It is the 4th largest in Vinhais since 2016 (of 11 with a page). Number 13 in Portugal in 2020, of 67.

Compare with…

Suggestions: Vinhais · 2025 Valpaços · 2026 Chaves · 2022 Vilarelho Da Raia · 2025

Burnt area: 942ha; Copernicus perimeter
Duration: 3days; 25 Jul 2020 – 27 Jul 2020
Municipalities hit: 4; freguesias
Started on: 25 Jul; 2020
Heat detections: 30; in a single hotspot: 551 MW
Danger at start: 49; Very high · FWI index
Average daily power: 1.6GW; detected power per day, on average

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 25 Jul27 Jul

Play back 27 Jul 2020

How it evolved, day by day

25 Jul 26 Jul 27 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

34°high

47km/h · peak gust

23%lowest humidity

It had gone 30 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: 7 ha in 2017.

How big is it?

It burned the equivalent of 0.6% of the area of London (9.4 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

Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil 207 inhabitants · 0.7 km from the centre where it started

859 ha reached on 25 Jul

29 %
Rebordelo 2.0 km from the centre

62 ha reached on 26 Jul

3.0 %
São Vicente 4.3 km from the centre

20 ha reached on 25 Jul

0.6 %
Curopos e Vale de Janeiro 245 inhabitants · 4.0 km from the centre

1 ha reached on 26 Jul

0.0 %

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 woodland50 %
Other natural land36 %
Agricultural areas14 %

Natura 2000 protected area affected: 94 %

ZEPA + LIC Montesinho / Nogueira PTCON0002 · PTZPE0003

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 25 July 2020 and burned 957 ha (the satellite measured 942 ha).

Vinhais Vilar de Lomba 25 July 2020 · 14:10 957 ha · extinguished on 26 July 2020 · cause: rekindling

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	Danger (FWI)
25 Jul	30.8 °C	26 %	47 km/h	Very high 49
26 Jul	33.0 °C	24 %	31 km/h	Very high 42
27 Jul	33.5 °C	23 %	41 km/h	Very high 48
28 Jul after	32.2 °C	22 %	37 km/h	Very high 46
29 Jul after	34.9 °C	18 %	31 km/h	Very high 44
30 Jul after	34.4 °C	23 %	42 km/h	Extreme 51
31 Jul after	33.6 °C	13 %	37 km/h	Extreme 52
1 Aug after	29.7 °C	31 %	39 km/h	Very high 42
2 Aug after	28.8 °C	28 %	41 km/h	Very high 44
3 Aug after	28.8 °C	30 %	39 km/h	Very high 42
4 Aug after	30.2 °C	26 %	32 km/h	Very high 39
5 Aug after	33.6 °C	19 %	29 km/h	Very high 43
6 Aug after	36.4 °C	16 %	48 km/h	Extreme 58

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 18 Jul 2020

After · 3 Aug 2020

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 23 July 2020 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

PM1029 µg/m³

WHO 15

2324252627282930

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 · 30Every 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 Portugal ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Vinhais fire last?: Copernicus dates it between 25 July 2020 and 27 July 2020: 3 days between the first and last image with fire. According to ICNF, it was detected on 25 July 2020 at 14:10 and declared extinguished on 26 July 2020.
How much area did it burn?: The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 942 hectares (9.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire entered 4 municipalities: Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil (859 ha, 29 %); Rebordelo (62 ha, 3.0 %); São Vicente (20 ha, 0.6 %); Curopos e Vale de Janeiro (1 ha, 0.0 %).
Did the fire reach a town?: The fire started in Vilar de Lomba e São Jomil and came within 0.7 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 33.5 °C, humidity dropped to 23 % and gusts hit 47 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 49, class Very 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 · Emergency number and official warnings ›

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

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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.

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How we know this

Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. 30 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
Compared with ICNF: 957 official ha against 942 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 (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.

Where it burned