Free tools · Seen from space
Fire in Metsimaholo
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 1,089 fire detections seen from space; 109 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2018, 746.
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
- 1,089Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 109 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 26 fire detections |
| December 2025 | 32 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 53 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 43 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 43 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 6 fire detections |
| May 2026 | 12 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 48 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 118 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 265 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 195 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 248 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 | 61 ha burnt (0.012% 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 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 48 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 | 248 | 232 | 291 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 195 | 191 | 233 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 265 | 263 | 293 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 118 | 111 | 126 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 48 | 48 | 54 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 12 | 12 | 11 | 48 ha | 0.009% | 96% |
| April 2026 | 6 | 6 | 2 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 96% |
| March 2026 | 43 | 43 | 7 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 96% |
| February 2026 | 43 | 41 | 19 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 96% |
| January 2026 | 53 | 50 | 55 | 61 ha | 0.012% | 96% |
| December 2025 | 32 | 32 | 36 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 96% |
| November 2025 | 26 | 25 | 15 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 96% |
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
- 2018746 fire detections, most in September 2018
- 2017581 fire detections, most in June 2017
- 2015558 fire detections, most in August 2015
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2023, 7,813 ha (1.5% of the place); 2024, 7,226 ha (1.4% of the place); 2019, 5,404 ha (1.0% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 1,031 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 508 | 2,068 ha | 0.40% |
| 2024 | 557 | 7,226 ha | 1.4% |
| 2023 | 525 | 7,813 ha | 1.5% |
| 2022 | 415 | 2,944 ha | 0.57% |
| 2021 | 478 | 4,619 ha | 0.90% |
| 2020 | 436 | 5,278 ha | 1.0% |
| 2019 | 428 | 5,404 ha | 1.0% |
| 2018 | 746 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 581 | · | · |
| 2016 | 515 | · | · |
| 2015 | 558 | · | · |
| 2014 | 554 | · | · |
| 2013 | 430 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 393 | · | · |
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 (Metsimaholo, Oranjeville)
- Ward 2 (Deneysville)
- Ward 3 (Bertha Shaft Village, Groenpunt)
- Ward 4
- Ward 5 (Clydesdale, Kragbron)
- Ward 6
- Ward 7
- Ward 8
- Ward 9 (Coalbrook)
- Ward 10
- Ward 11
- Ward 12 (Zamdela)
- Ward 13
- Ward 14 (Zamdela)
- Ward 15 (Hunterville, Roodia)
- Ward 16 (Sasolburg)
- Ward 17 (Sasolburg, Welgelegen-Wes)
- Ward 18 (Sasolburg)
- Ward 19 (Vaalpark)
- Ward 20
- Ward 21 (Sandersville)
- Ward 22 (Heilbron, Phiritona)
- Ward 23
Places in each ward: © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Everything we hold for Metsimaholo, 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.