Free tools · Seen from space
Fire in Govan Mbeki
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 1,414 fire detections seen from space; 247 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2013, 1,201.
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
- 1,414Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 247 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 1 fire detection |
| December 2025 | 0 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 6 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 5 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 4 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 7 fire detections |
| May 2026 | 13 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 64 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 228 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 412 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 263 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 411 fire detections |
| November 2025 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| December 2025 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| January 2026 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| February 2026 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| March 2026 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| April 2026 | 115 ha burnt (0.039% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 132 ha burnt (0.045% 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 | 411 | 398 | 358 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 263 | 255 | 258 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 412 | 396 | 463 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 228 | 208 | 249 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 64 | 62 | 47 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 13 | 13 | 28 | 132 ha | 0.045% | 99% |
| April 2026 | 7 | 7 | 6 | 115 ha | 0.039% | 99% |
| March 2026 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 99% |
| February 2026 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 99% |
| January 2026 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 99% |
| December 2025 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 99% |
| November 2025 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 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
- 20131,201 fire detections, most in August 2013
- 20141,053 fire detections, most in August 2014
- 2018686 fire detections, most in June 2018
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2019, 10,726 ha (3.6% of the place); 2023, 9,988 ha (3.4% of the place); 2021, 9,886 ha (3.3% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 1,413 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 298 | 4,129 ha | 1.4% |
| 2024 | 500 | 8,783 ha | 3.0% |
| 2023 | 653 | 9,988 ha | 3.4% |
| 2022 | 362 | 4,216 ha | 1.4% |
| 2021 | 621 | 9,886 ha | 3.3% |
| 2020 | 469 | 7,673 ha | 2.6% |
| 2019 | 660 | 10,726 ha | 3.6% |
| 2018 | 686 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 487 | · | · |
| 2016 | 270 | · | · |
| 2015 | 403 | · | · |
| 2014 | 1,053 | · | · |
| 2013 | 1,201 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 548 | · | · |
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 (Eendrag, Leandra)
- Ward 2
- Ward 3
- Ward 4 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 5 (Secunda)
- Ward 6 (Lebohang)
- Ward 7 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 8 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 9 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 10 (Charl Cilliers)
- Ward 11 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 12 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 13 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 14 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 15 (Bethal)
- Ward 16 (Kinross)
- Ward 17 (Kinross)
- Ward 18 (Evander)
- Ward 19 (Brendan Village)
- Ward 20 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 21 (Secunda, Trichardt)
- Ward 22
- Ward 23
- Ward 24
- Ward 25 (Trichardt)
- Ward 26 (Milanpark)
- Ward 27 (eMzinoni)
- Ward 28 (Bethal East, Bethalrand)
- Ward 29 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 30 (Secunda, Trichardt)
- Ward 31 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 32 (eMbalenhle)
- Ward 33 (Secunda)
Places in each ward: © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Everything we hold for Govan Mbeki, 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.