Free tools · Seen from space
Fire in Ratlou
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 322 fire detections seen from space; 42 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2023, 1,595.
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
- 322Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 42 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 3 fire detections |
| December 2025 | 0 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 2 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 6 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 0 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 1 fire detection |
| May 2026 | 6 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 22 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 165 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 48 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 61 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 8 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 | 21 ha burnt (0.004% of the place) |
| April 2026 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 21 ha burnt (0.004% 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 | 8 | 7 | 8 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 61 | 55 | 87 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 48 | 43 | 64 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 165 | 150 | 240 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 22 | 19 | 16 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 6 | 6 | 8 | 21 ha | 0.004% | 100% |
| April 2026 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 100% |
| March 2026 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 21 ha | 0.004% | 100% |
| February 2026 | 6 | 5 | 11 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 100% |
| January 2026 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 100% |
| December 2025 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 100% |
| November 2025 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 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
- 20231,595 fire detections, most in August 2023; 40,856 ha burnt
- 20221,363 fire detections, most in October 2022; 14,588 ha burnt
- 2021587 fire detections, most in September 2021; 11,022 ha burnt
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2023, 40,856 ha (8.4% of the place); 2022, 14,588 ha (3.0% of the place); 2021, 11,022 ha (2.3% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 319 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 446 | 7,060 ha | 1.4% |
| 2024 | 226 | 2,753 ha | 0.56% |
| 2023 | 1,595 | 40,856 ha | 8.4% |
| 2022 | 1,363 | 14,588 ha | 3.0% |
| 2021 | 587 | 11,022 ha | 2.3% |
| 2020 | 120 | 2,244 ha | 0.46% |
| 2019 | 28 | 129 ha | 0.027% |
| 2018 | 173 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 51 | · | · |
| 2016 | 26 | · | · |
| 2015 | 65 | · | · |
| 2014 | 108 | · | · |
| 2013 | 30 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 423 | · | · |
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 (Mabule, Masamane)
- Ward 2 (Leporung, Mokgobistad)
- Ward 3 (Botshabelo, Masibi)
- Ward 4 (Logageng, Matloding)
- Ward 5 (Setlagole)
- Ward 6
- Ward 7 (Madibogo Pan)
- Ward 8 (Kraaipan)
- Ward 9
- Ward 10 (Bathobatho)
- Ward 11 (Thutlwane, Mareetsane)
- Ward 12 (Madibogo)
- Ward 13 (Setlhwatlhwe)
- Ward 14
Places in each ward: © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Everything we hold for Ratlou, 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.