Burned area
satellite only142ha
Perimeter published by EFFIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- perimeter revised on 26 January 2022
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
AL · Albania · –
Vlorë fire, 28 August 2017 Vlorë, Sarandë
Out · last detection 31 Aug 2017, 00:37 UTC
The fire started on 28 August 2017 in Vlorë, Albania, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 142 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 118th largest in Vlorë since 2016 (of 160 with a page). Number 56 in Albania in 2017, of 83.
The power measured by the satellite is low (11.7 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-24matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only4days
28 Aug 2017 to 31 Aug 2017: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 31 Aug 2017, 00:37 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only28 Aug 2017
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- EFFIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 28 Aug 2017
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only21
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 12 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 28 Aug 2017 – 31 Aug 2017
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only38MW
Total radiative power on 28 August 2017; hotspots that day: 4.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 28 Aug 2017
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model39.2FWI · very high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 6.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 28 Aug 2017, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model28.6°C · 24% RH
High of 28.6 °C and minimum humidity of 24% on 28 August 2017; gusts of 39 km/h on 28 August 2017.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 28 Aug 2017 – 31 Aug 2017
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
-
· reconstructed perimeterEFFIS (Copernicus) revises the perimeter
What was saved on 24 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 142 ha
- Dates
- 28 Aug 2017 – 31 Aug 2017
- Name
- Vlorë
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/vlore-vlore-2017-08-6?v=2026-10-24A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire vlore-vlore-2017-08-6.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017-08-28 | 4 | 38 | 28.6 | 13.1 | 24 | 8.7 | 38.9 | 0 | 39.2 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-29 | 6 | 31 | 26.7 | 14.6 | 37 | 7 | 29.5 | 3.3 | 33.9 | alto | 1 |
| 2017-08-30 | 10 | 19 | 24.3 | 13.3 | 34 | 7 | 31 | 0 | 5.4 | bajo | 1 |
| 2017-08-31 | 1 | 0 | 23.9 | 13 | 39 | 7.6 | 29.2 | 0 | 16.5 | moderado | 1 |
| 2017-09-01 | 0 | 0 | 24.6 | 11.3 | 28 | 6.4 | 27 | 0 | 25.8 | alto | 0 |
| 2017-09-02 | 0 | 0 | 26.3 | 12.5 | 34 | 6.8 | 30.6 | 0 | 26.4 | alto | 0 |
| 2017-09-03 | 0 | 0 | 19.7 | 13 | 59 | 7.6 | 41 | 7.9 | 2.1 | muy_bajo | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: EFFIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 142ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 4days
- 28 Aug 2017 – 31 Aug 2017
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 28 Aug
- 2017
- Heat detections
- 21
- in a single hotspot: 12 MW
- Danger at start
- 39
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 22MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
28 Aug31 Aug
31 Aug 2017
How it evolved, day by day
28 Aug
29 Aug
30 Aug
31 Aug
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
29°high
39km/h · peak gust
24%lowest humidity
It had gone 6 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 7.9 mm on 3 Sept.
This area had burned before
No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.
What happened to each town
-
Vlorë where it started74 ha reached on 28 Aug0.0 %
-
68 ha reached on 28 Aug0.1 %
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
- Other natural land67 %
- Broadleaved forest32 %
- Scrub and transitional woodland0.7 %
Land cover inside the perimeter according to Corine Land Cover, as reported by Copernicus.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2015Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20
Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2015, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28 Aug | 28.6 °C | 24 % | 39 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 39 |
| 29 Aug | 26.7 °C | 37 % | 30 km/h | 3.3 mm | High 34 |
| 30 Aug | 24.3 °C | 34 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Low 5 |
| 31 Aug | 23.9 °C | 39 % | 29 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 16 |
| 1 Sept after | 24.6 °C | 28 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 2 Sept after | 26.3 °C | 34 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 26 |
| 3 Sept after | 19.7 °C | 59 % | 41 km/h | 7.9 mm | Very low 2 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 39.2, a minimum humidity of 24% and 6 days without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 23.
FWI at the start
39.2
Minimum humidity
24 %
Days without rain
6
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Vlorë fire, 28 August 2017
142 ha
4 days
FWI 39.2
Min. humidity 24 %
Tepelenë fire, August 2025
1,296 ha
3 days
FWI 37.7
Min. humidity 23 %
27 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.3 mm on 14 Aug.
Sarandë fire, August 2025
551 ha
2 days
FWI 38.8
Min. humidity 26 %
54 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 6.5 mm on 22 Aug.
Tepelenë fire, August 2021
138 ha
2 days
FWI 39.0
Min. humidity 25 %
24 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Kavajë fire, August 2026
386 ha
4 days
FWI 39.0
Min. humidity 26 %
119 km away, in 2026
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Bulqizë fire, August 2025
189 ha
5 days
FWI 40.1
Min. humidity 26 %
150 km away, in 2025
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 6.3 mm on 17 Aug.
What happened to them
- 4 days
- median duration
- 228 ha
- median area
- 17 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 3.0 mm
- rain at the end (median; 18 of 23 had it)
It stayed below its twins: 142 ha against a median of 228 ha. It lasted 4 days, against 4 days.
In 5 of 23, 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 3.0 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
7.9 mmfirst rain
3 Sept3 days after it ended
39km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 31 Aug, and on 3 Sept 7.9 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 18 of 23, with a median of 3.0 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.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 21 Aug 2017
After · 7 Sept 2017
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
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 29 August 2017 the air beside the fire reached 19 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak19 µg/m³
Days over the guideline1 day
PM1029 µg/m³
WHO 15
26 Aug28 Aug30 Aug1 Sept3 Sept
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
- 9,856 haSarandë24 July 2025 · 13 days · 13 km away
- 1,862 haGjirokastërJuly 2024 · 4 days · 21 km away
- 2,063 haTepelenë30 July 2024 · 5 days · 25 km away
- 4,153 haDelvinë8 July 2024 · 6 days · 33 km away
- 12,229 haSarandë6 August 2025 · 9 days · 36 km away
- 5,609 haGjirokastër8 August 2017 · 5 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Vlorë fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 28 August 2017 to 31 August 2017 (4 days). The perimeter dates it from 28 August 2017 to 29 August 2017.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 142 hectares (1.4 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Vlorë (74 ha, 0.0 %); Sarandë (68 ha, 0.1 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 28.6 °C, humidity dropped to 24 % and gusts hit 39 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 39, class Very high.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Albania (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: 23. Their median duration was 4 days and their median area 228 ha; 17 % went past 1,000 ha. In 5 of 23, 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 3.0 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: 128 · 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.
No changes since 24 October 2026.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
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 adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 28 August 2017 to 29 August 2017. 21 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2015, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
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 ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic). 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.