Fires in Spain and Portugal

Fires in Spain and Portugal

In late July 2004, fires broke out—many due to arson—across Spain and Portugal. According to news reports, five new fires broke out on Saturday, July 31, in northwest Spain. This image was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite on August 2, 2004, and areas where MODIS detected active fires are outlined in red. The largest concentration of fires is located in the Galicia region, one of Spain’s 19 administrative divisions, which are called “autonomous communities.” South of the large concentration of fires in Spain, MODIS detected a few scattered fires burning in Portugal. The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at additional resolutions.

Image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center