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Fire in Drakenstein
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 716 fire detections seen from space; 10,482 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2020, 916.
Two readings from space. Fire detections are hot spots a VIIRS satellite saw as it passed, each about 375 m across, counted where they fall in the place: a big fire gives many, a short one between passes none. Burnt area is the ground that looks burnt afterwards, from Sentinel-3 at 300 m, in hectares. Neither is a fire report from the ground.
The last twelve months
- 716Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 10,482 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 20 fire detections |
| December 2025 | 44 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 517 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 26 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 46 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 33 fire detections |
| May 2026 | 7 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 9 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 0 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 3 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 9 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 2 fire detections |
| November 2025 | 86 ha burnt (0.056% of the place) |
| December 2025 | 361 ha burnt (0.24% of the place) |
| January 2026 | 7,490 ha burnt (4.9% of the place) |
| February 2026 | 630 ha burnt (0.41% of the place) |
| March 2026 | 1,620 ha burnt (1.1% of the place) |
| April 2026 | 282 ha burnt (0.18% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 13 ha burnt (0.009% of the place) |
| June 2026 | not out yet |
| July 2026 | not out yet |
| August 2026 | not out yet |
| September 2026 | not out yet |
| October 2026 | not out yet |
| Month | Detections | Nominal or high confidence | NOAA-20 (second reading) | Burnt | Share of the place | Land seen |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| October 2026 | 2 | 2 | 6 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 9 | 9 | 7 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 3 | 3 | 5 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 0 | 0 | 0 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 9 | 9 | 7 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 7 | 7 | 9 | 13 ha | 0.009% | 99% |
| April 2026 | 33 | 32 | 29 | 282 ha | 0.18% | 99% |
| March 2026 | 46 | 37 | 51 | 1,620 ha | 1.1% | 99% |
| February 2026 | 26 | 23 | 36 | 630 ha | 0.41% | 99% |
| January 2026 | 517 | 472 | 602 | 7,490 ha | 4.9% | 99% |
| December 2025 | 44 | 38 | 31 | 361 ha | 0.24% | 99% |
| November 2025 | 20 | 16 | 16 | 86 ha | 0.056% | 99% |
NOAA-20 carries the same instrument as S-NPP and passes about 50 minutes apart, so its count is a second reading of the same fires, not extra fires. “Land seen” is the share of the place’s land the burnt-area product saw often enough that month to tell.
The worst years
- 2020916 fire detections, most in February 2020; 5,351 ha burnt
- 2017880 fire detections, most in February 2017
- 2024671 fire detections, most in January 2024; 8,340 ha burnt
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2024, 8,340 ha (5.4% of the place); 2020, 5,351 ha (3.5% of the place); 2025, 4,019 ha (2.6% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 652 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 408 | 4,019 ha | 2.6% |
| 2024 | 671 | 8,340 ha | 5.4% |
| 2023 | 234 | 1,454 ha | 0.95% |
| 2022 | 242 | 1,592 ha | 1.0% |
| 2021 | 193 | 1,594 ha | 1.0% |
| 2020 | 916 | 5,351 ha | 3.5% |
| 2019 | 169 | 945 ha | 0.62% |
| 2018 | 250 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 880 | · | · |
| 2016 | 310 | · | · |
| 2015 | 575 | · | · |
| 2014 | 322 | · | · |
| 2013 | 472 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 243 | · | · |
Detections from February 2012 (S-NPP); burnt area from July 2018, so whole years of it from 2019. A larger place’s figures are the sums of its 2026 wards.
Each ward
- Ward 1 (Simondium)
- Ward 2 (Wellington, Berg en Dal)
- Ward 3 (Windmeul)
- Ward 4 (Paarl, Vrykyk)
- Ward 5 (Hillcrest, Newtown-Wes)
- Ward 6 (Newtown-Wes)
- Ward 7 (Hillcrest)
- Ward 8 (Newtown-Wes)
- Ward 9 (Newtown-Wes, Groenheuwel)
- Ward 10 (Protea)
- Ward 11 (Newton, Newton-Wes)
- Ward 12 (Newtown-Wes)
- Ward 13 (Dalvale)
- Ward 14 (Groenheuwel, Lonwabo)
- Ward 15 (Courtrai, De Zoete Inval)
- Ward 16 (Dalvale, Groenheuwel)
- Ward 17 (Noorder-Paarl, Premier Estate)
- Ward 18 (Langham, Onverwacht)
- Ward 19 (Paarl, Dal Josafat)
- Ward 20 (Bloomsbury, Rabiesdale)
- Ward 21 (Chicago)
- Ward 22 (Charleston Hill, New Orleans)
- Ward 23 (Denneburg)
- Ward 24 (Chicago)
- Ward 25 (Allandale)
- Ward 26 (Klein-Drakenstein)
- Ward 27 (Klein-Drakenstein)
- Ward 28 (Val De Vie, Victor Verster)
- Ward 29 (Waterkloof Farm)
- Ward 30
- Ward 31 (Gouda, Hermon)
- Ward 32 (Fairyland, Greenside)
- Ward 33 (Bloomsbury, Klein Parys)
Places in each ward: © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Everything we hold for Drakenstein, on one page
Source
Seen from space by American and European satellites: not fires reported on the ground.
How we worked this out
What we changed: we counted FIRMS’s detections (presumed vegetation fires only) by the 2026 ward their position falls in, and summed CLMS’s burned fraction times each pixel’s area over each ward; municipalities, districts and provinces are the sums of their wards.
Fire detections: we acknowledge the use of data and/or imagery from NASA’s Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS), part of NASA’s LANCE (VIIRS 375 m, S-NPP and NOAA-20). Burnt area: generated using European Union’s Copernicus Land Monitoring Service information (Burnt Area 300 m version 4, DOI 10.2909/8fa58061-28ab-49bb-9b77-c26b50733e34), modified; this does not mean the European Union endorses us.
Dataset: burnt area and fire, release of 12 November 2026.