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Fire in Sol Plaatje
Fire in the twelve months to October 2026: 196 fire detections seen from space; 500 ha burnt in the 7 of those months with burnt area out. The most since 2012: 2021, 1,089.
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
- 196Fire detectionsNovember 2025 to October 2026
- 500 haBurnt7 of the twelve months; the rest not out yet
Show the numbers
| When or what | Figure |
|---|---|
| November 2025 | 19 fire detections |
| December 2025 | 6 fire detections |
| January 2026 | 21 fire detections |
| February 2026 | 7 fire detections |
| March 2026 | 0 fire detections |
| April 2026 | 1 fire detection |
| May 2026 | 7 fire detections |
| June 2026 | 10 fire detections |
| July 2026 | 36 fire detections |
| August 2026 | 64 fire detections |
| September 2026 | 2 fire detections |
| October 2026 | 23 fire detections |
| November 2025 | 59 ha burnt (0.017% of the place) |
| December 2025 | 80 ha burnt (0.023% of the place) |
| January 2026 | 86 ha burnt (0.025% of the place) |
| February 2026 | 209 ha burnt (0.060% of the place) |
| March 2026 | 0.0 ha burnt (0.000% of the place) |
| April 2026 | 8.0 ha burnt (0.002% of the place) |
| May 2026 | 58 ha burnt (0.017% 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 | 23 | 15 | 13 | not out yet | · | · |
| September 2026 | 2 | 2 | 1 | not out yet | · | · |
| August 2026 | 64 | 61 | 52 | not out yet | · | · |
| July 2026 | 36 | 34 | 53 | not out yet | · | · |
| June 2026 | 10 | 10 | 13 | not out yet | · | · |
| May 2026 | 7 | 7 | 6 | 58 ha | 0.017% | 100% |
| April 2026 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 8.0 ha | 0.002% | 100% |
| March 2026 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0.0 ha | 0.000% | 100% |
| February 2026 | 7 | 4 | 13 | 209 ha | 0.060% | 100% |
| January 2026 | 21 | 11 | 21 | 86 ha | 0.025% | 100% |
| December 2025 | 6 | 4 | 10 | 80 ha | 0.023% | 100% |
| November 2025 | 19 | 9 | 13 | 59 ha | 0.017% | 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
- 20211,089 fire detections, most in September 2021; 56,015 ha burnt
- 2012551 fire detections, most in October 2012
- 2023492 fire detections, most in July 2023; 6,399 ha burnt
By hectares burnt (whole years from 2019): 2021, 56,015 ha (16.2% of the place); 2022, 9,866 ha (2.9% of the place); 2020, 6,541 ha (1.9% of the place).
Every year since 2012
| Year | Fire detections | Burnt | Share of the place |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (10 months) | 171 | 5 months out | · |
| 2025 | 269 | 4,539 ha | 1.3% |
| 2024 | 317 | 3,922 ha | 1.1% |
| 2023 | 492 | 6,399 ha | 1.9% |
| 2022 | 488 | 9,866 ha | 2.9% |
| 2021 | 1,089 | 56,015 ha | 16.2% |
| 2020 | 364 | 6,541 ha | 1.9% |
| 2019 | 153 | 1,723 ha | 0.50% |
| 2018 | 281 | 6 months out | · |
| 2017 | 257 | · | · |
| 2016 | 71 | · | · |
| 2015 | 103 | · | · |
| 2014 | 32 | · | · |
| 2013 | 92 | · | · |
| 2012 (11 months) | 551 | · | · |
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 (Roodepan)
- Ward 2 (Roodepan)
- Ward 3 (Homevale, Kanfers Dam)
- Ward 4 (Vergenoeg, Homestead)
- Ward 5 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 6 (Homevale, Kanfers Dam)
- Ward 7 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 8 (Kirstenhof, Riviera)
- Ward 9 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 10 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 11 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 12 (Homestead, Vergenoeg)
- Ward 13 (Galeshewe)
- Ward 14 (Ashburnham, Floors)
- Ward 15 (Hill Crest)
- Ward 16 (Vergenoeg)
- Ward 17 (Kirstenhof, Riviera)
- Ward 18 (Kirstenhof, Riviera)
- Ward 19 (Galeshewe, Kirstenhof)
- Ward 20 (Kimberley, Albertynshof)
- Ward 21 (Belgravia, Cassandra)
- Ward 22 (Greenpoint)
- Ward 23 (El Torro Park, Monument Heights)
- Ward 24 (Carters Glen, Hadison Park)
- Ward 25 (Klisserville, Labram)
- Ward 26 (Diskobolos, Ronald's Vlei)
- Ward 27 (Ritchie, Rietvale)
- Ward 28 (Beaconsfield, Colville)
- Ward 29 (Roodepan)
- Ward 30 (Roodepan)
- Ward 31 (Riviera)
- Ward 32 (Platfontein)
- Ward 33 (Galeshewe, Gemdene)
Places in each ward: © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Everything we hold for Sol Plaatje, 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.