Free tools · Seen from space
Fire in O.R.Tambo
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 4,343 fire detections seen from space; 7,248 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2024, 7,299.
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
- 4,343Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 7,248 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 76 fire detections |
| December 2025 | 28 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 125 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 30 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 47 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 92 fire detections |
| May 2026 | 502 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 786 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 1,716 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 844 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 66 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 31 fire detections |
| November 2025 | 67 ha burnt (0.006% of the place) |
| December 2025 | 53 ha burnt (0.004% of the place) |
| January 2026 | 197 ha burnt (0.016% of the place) |
| February 2026 | 44 ha burnt (0.004% of the place) |
| March 2026 | 169 ha burnt (0.014% of the place) |
| April 2026 | 1,216 ha burnt (0.10% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 5,502 ha burnt (0.45% 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 | 31 | 30 | 32 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 66 | 65 | 54 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 844 | 823 | 928 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 1,716 | 1,661 | 2,201 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 786 | 777 | 777 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 502 | 486 | 486 | 5,502 ha | 0.45% | 100% |
| April 2026 | 92 | 90 | 159 | 1,216 ha | 0.10% | 100% |
| March 2026 | 47 | 46 | 62 | 169 ha | 0.014% | 100% |
| February 2026 | 30 | 27 | 39 | 44 ha | 0.004% | 100% |
| January 2026 | 125 | 94 | 137 | 197 ha | 0.016% | 100% |
| December 2025 | 28 | 26 | 49 | 53 ha | 0.004% | 100% |
| November 2025 | 76 | 68 | 72 | 67 ha | 0.006% | 100% |
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
- 20247,299 fire detections, most in August 2024; 113,527 ha burnt
- 20136,510 fire detections, most in August 2013
- 20236,158 fire detections, most in August 2023; 70,865 ha burnt
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2024, 113,527 ha (9.4% of the place); 2023, 70,865 ha (5.8% of the place); 2020, 50,458 ha (4.2% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 4,239 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 3,420 | 40,055 ha | 3.3% |
| 2024 | 7,299 | 113,527 ha | 9.4% |
| 2023 | 6,158 | 70,865 ha | 5.8% |
| 2022 | 3,808 | 34,083 ha | 2.8% |
| 2021 | 4,147 | 48,661 ha | 4.0% |
| 2020 | 4,592 | 50,458 ha | 4.2% |
| 2019 | 4,589 | 47,027 ha | 3.9% |
| 2018 | 3,220 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 2,952 | · | · |
| 2016 | 2,911 | · | · |
| 2015 | 2,572 | · | · |
| 2014 | 4,732 | · | · |
| 2013 | 6,510 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 4,032 | · | · |
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.
Everything we hold for O.R.Tambo, 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.