Burned area
satellite only3,627ha
Perimeter published by GWIS (Copernicus).
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus)
- Date
- 24 Aug 2024 – 28 Aug 2024
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page to compare it with.
ZA · South Africa · –
Chief Albert Luthuli fire, 24 August 2024 Emakhazeni, Chief Albert Luthuli
Out · last detection 28 Aug 2024, 11:54 UTC
The fire started on 24 August 2024 in Chief Albert Luthuli, South Africa, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,627 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 51th largest in Mpumalanga since 2016 (of 182 with a page). Number 48 in South Africa in 2024, of 121.
Use this data
Compare with…
Use this data
Fire page data · version 2026-10-27matches the official recordwith caveatssatellite onlymodel
When copying, the sentence is
Tick the figures you want: they make up the lede and the CSV.
Duration by satellite
satellite only5days
24 Aug 2024 to 28 Aug 2024: first and last day with fire on the page.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- last detection: 28 Aug 2024, 11:54 UTC
+− cross-check
Satellites pass a few times a day and cloud or smoke can hide the fire: a lack of detections is not an official extinction. Each country’s emergency service declares a fire contained or out.
Start
satellite only24 Aug 2024
First day with fire seen by the satellites or the perimeter.
- Source
- GWIS (Copernicus) · NASA FIRMS · VIIRS
- Date
- 24 Aug 2024
+− cross-check
No official record is matched to this page, so the alert time and the cause are not known here.
Hotspots
satellite only156
VIIRS detections at 375 m. Most intense hotspot: 95 MW.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (Suomi NPP)
- Date
- 24 Aug 2024 – 28 Aug 2024
+− cross-check
There is no official record to compare with. Each hotspot is a pixel detected in one satellite pass, not a separate fire.
The worst day
satellite only797MW
Total radiative power on 26 August 2024; hotspots that day: 50.
- Source
- NASA FIRMS · VIIRS (FRP)
- Date
- 26 Aug 2024
+− cross-check
Fire radiative power (FRP) measures the energy the fire gives off when the satellite passes. Added up by day, it compares intensity, not area.
Danger at the start
model25.2FWI · high
Fire Weather Index (Canadian system) computed by WorldFires for the day the fire started. Consecutive days without rain before: 60.
- Source
- WorldFires calculation (Canadian FWI system)
- Date
- 24 Aug 2024, local noon
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
This is an index computed from weather model data, not a measurement of the fire nor an official warning. Danger warnings are issued by each country’s authority. Emergency number and official warnings
Weather during the fire
model27.1°C · 7% RH
High of 27.1 °C and minimum humidity of 7% on 27 August 2024; gusts of 51 km/h on 27 August 2024.
- Source
- weather model at the fire’s grid cell
- Date
- 24 Aug 2024 – 28 Aug 2024
- Model
- ERA5 0,25° (ECMWF · Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com
+− cross-check
These are model values for a cell of about 25 km, not from a weather station: they may differ from what was measured on the ground.
Living inside
model≈ 30people
Estimated residents inside the perimeter and 1.4 ha of built-up area (100 m grid, epoch 2025).
- Source
- GHSL R2023A · JRC
- Date
- calculated on 24 October 2026
+− cross-check
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned.
This page’s change log has been kept since 24 October 2026: every night what it publishes is compared and the difference is logged. Anything earlier is reconstructed from each source’s date and marked as reconstructed.
Show
-
· reconstructed weatherWeather and FWI computed from the ERA5 reanalysis
-
logLast day with fire: 26 August 2024 → 28 August 2024.
-
· reconstructed GHSLPopulation and built-up area computed
What was saved on 27 October 2026
Every night a snapshot of what the page shows is saved. If anything changes, it appears in the list as a log entry.
- Area
- 3,627 ha
- Dates
- 24 Aug 2024 – 28 Aug 2024
- Name
- Chief Albert Luthuli
- Official record
- —
Versioned permanent link
https://worldfires.org/en/fire/chief-albert-luthuli-2024-08-2?v=2026-10-27A version keeps the area, dates, name and official record; the area as it was logged (changes under 2% are not logged). The map, hotspots and weather always show today’s data.
Citation
A lede of about 60 words figures only, no adjectives
CSV for this fire chief-albert-luthuli-2024-08-2.csv · daily, no individual hotspots
| fecha | focos_viirs | frp_mw | tmax_c | tmin_c | hr_min_pct | viento_max_kmh | racha_max_kmh | precip_mm | fwi | clase_fwi | dentro_del_incendio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-08-24 | 28 | 192 | 21.8 | 3.1 | 26 | 11.3 | 30.2 | 0 | 25.2 | alto | 1 |
| 2024-08-25 | 77 | 565 | 24.6 | 5.8 | 13 | 12.4 | 26.3 | 0 | 34.3 | alto | 1 |
| 2024-08-26 | 50 | 797 | 25.2 | 5.4 | 17 | 19.2 | 48.6 | 0 | 40.8 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2024-08-27 | 0 | 0 | 27.1 | 10.2 | 7 | 21.2 | 50.8 | 0 | 51.9 | extremo | 1 |
| 2024-08-28 | 1 | 5 | 26.7 | 11 | 8 | 15.5 | 37.8 | 0 | 46 | muy_alto | 1 |
| 2024-08-29 | 0 | 0 | 12.2 | 6.1 | 73 | 18.7 | 45.7 | 1.1 | 11.8 | moderado | 0 |
It is generated in your browser from this page’s data: one file per fire, aggregated by day and without individual hotspots.
Live widget for your story
It updates itself while the fire is still active and links to this page. Free, with the attribution shown at the bottom.
Sources for this page: GWIS (Copernicus), NASA FIRMS (VIIRS), ERA5 (ECMWF/Copernicus C3S) · Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0), GHSL (JRC). Open-Meteo.com · How we build fire pages: methodology
- Burnt area
- 3,627ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 5days
- 24 Aug 2024 – 28 Aug 2024
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 24 Aug
- 2024
- Heat detections
- 156
- in a single hotspot: 95 MW
- Danger at start
- 25
- High · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 390MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
HOTSPOTS BY DAY
24 Aug28 Aug
28 Aug 2024
How it evolved, day by day
24 Aug
25 Aug
26 Aug
28 Aug
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
27°high
51km/h · peak gust
7%lowest humidity
It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 1.1 mm on 29 Aug.
This area had burned before
82% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 285 ha in 2018, 2,686 ha in 2019, 1,638 ha in 2021, 297 ha in 2023. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 2,976 ha that had burned before.
- 2,686 ha Emakhazeni fire, October 2019 4,380 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,638 ha Chief Albert Luthuli fire, June 2021 2,009 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 285 ha Chief Albert Luthuli fire, June 2018 2,913 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
How big is it?
London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).
Paris boundary: geoBoundaries · Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière (IGN-F) (Etalab Open License 2.0).
Madrid boundary: geoBoundaries · Open Data ESRI, IGN Central Registry of Cartography Area (CC BY 4.0).
Berlin boundary: geoBoundaries · Federal Agency for Cartography and Geodesy (dl-de/by-2-0).
This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.
What happened to each town
-
2,794 ha reached on 25 Aug0.6 %
-
Chief Albert Luthuli where it started854 ha reached on 24 Aug0.2 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance runs from the point marking the centre of each area to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
People and buildings inside the perimeter
GHSL 2025Built-up area1.4 ha
Residents≈ 30
Inside the perimeter there were about 1.4 hectares of built-up land and about 30 residents (GHSL 2025, satellite-based estimate).
This is an estimate on 100 m cells, made from satellite imagery and census data: it does not mean that homes burned or that anyone was harmed. The perimeter also contains land that never burned. The GHSL 2025 epoch is a projection made from 2020 and earlier data.
Source: Global Human Settlement Layer (GHS-BUILT-S and GHS-POP R2023A), European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC), © European Union, CC BY 4.0. Sum inside the perimeter computed by WorldFires. human-settlement.emergency.copernicus.eu
The weather day by day
ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
Started with 60 days without rain: 10.0 % of the area in South Africa
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24 Aug | 21.8 °C | 26 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 25 Aug | 24.6 °C | 13 % | 26 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 34 |
| 26 Aug | 25.2 °C | 17 % | 49 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 41 |
| 27 Aug | 27.1 °C | 7 % | 51 km/h | 0.0 mm | Extreme 52 |
| 28 Aug | 26.7 °C | 8 % | 38 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 46 |
| 29 Aug after | 12.2 °C | 73 % | 46 km/h | 1.1 mm | Moderate 12 |
Its twins: fires that started in the same weather
It started with an FWI of 25.2, a minimum humidity of 26% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 18.
FWI at the start
25.2
Minimum humidity
26 %
Days without rain
60+
this fire
chosen twins
rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar
Outlines of the closest twins
This fire · Chief Albert Luthuli fire, 24 August 2024
3,627 ha
5 days
FWI 25.2
Min. humidity 26 %
Dr JS Moroka fire, July 2017
2,619 ha
8 days
FWI 28.3
Min. humidity 27 %
170 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Lepele-Nkumpi fire, July 2017
3,650 ha
6 days
FWI 27.8
Min. humidity 28 %
198 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Lepele-Nkumpi fire, August 2017
3,340 ha
10 days
FWI 28.1
Min. humidity 24 %
210 km away, in 2017
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.
Thaba Chweu fire, September 2021
2,911 ha
2 days
FWI 25.0
Min. humidity 32 %
97 km away, in 2021
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 1.2 mm on 29 Sept.
Ba-Phalaborwa fire, September 2022
4,697 ha
5 days
FWI 26.1
Min. humidity 29 %
241 km away, in 2022
First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: 3.9 mm on 20 Sept.
What happened to them
- 5 days
- median duration
- 2,872 ha
- median area
- 100 %
- went past 1,000 ha
- 3.9 mm
- rain at the end (median; 5 of 18 had it)
It burned an area similar to its twins (3,627 ha against a median of 2,872 ha) and lasted 5 days, against 5 days.
In 13 of 18, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.9 mm.
This is a bank of analogues: it shows what usually happens, not what will happen. With fewer than 15 twins we give no figures. How we calculate it
How it ended
1.1 mmfirst rain
29 Augthe day after it ended
51km/h · max. gust
It was considered over on 28 Aug, and on 29 Aug 1.1 mm fell. We do not know whether the rain or the firefighters put it out. Twins with rain when they ended: 5 of 18, with a median of 3.9 mm.
Weather on this page: Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
How a twin is chosen
- Same area: fires that have already ended, less than 250 km from this one, since 2016.
- Same start: we compare the FWI on the first day, the minimum humidity that day and the run of days without rain before it. The slider sets how much they may differ.
- Only pages with final weather data (ERA5 reanalysis) calculated in the same way as this fire’s; agricultural and grass burns and pages with data under review are left out.
- Fires burning at the same time as this one (a week before or after) are left out: they share the same spell of weather and do not count as a precedent.
- They are sorted by similarity, and the outlines of the first five are drawn.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
↔
Before · 17 Aug 2024
After · 4 Sept 2024
Sentinel-2 did not pass over on that day. Try another date, or use false colour, which is daily.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 29 August 2024 the air beside the fire reached 68 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 21: 1.4 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
PM2.5 peak68 µg/m³
Days over the guideline2 days
PM1098 µg/m³
Optical depth0.72
WHO 15
22 Aug24 Aug26 Aug28 Aug
Good
Fair
Moderate
Poor
Very poor
Extremely poor
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 156Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV
Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 4,380 haEmakhazeni6 October 2019 · 4 days · 0 km away
- 4,184 haEmakhazeniAugust 2020 · 4 days · 8 km away
- 3,510 haChief Albert Luthuli4 August 2026 · 3 days · 14 km away
- 3,455 haEmakhazeniSeptember 2022 · 3 days · 14 km away
- 4,659 haChief Albert LuthuliJuly 2024 · 2 days · 25 km away
- 5,607 haEmakhazeniSeptember 2016 · 4 days · 29 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Chief Albert Luthuli fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 24 August 2024 to 28 August 2024 (5 days). The perimeter dates it from 24 August 2024 to 26 August 2024.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,627 hectares (36.3 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Emakhazeni (2,794 ha, 0.6 %); Chief Albert Luthuli (854 ha, 0.2 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 27.1 °C, humidity dropped to 7 % and gusts hit 51 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 52, class Extreme.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South Africa (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
- How did the fires that started in similar weather in this area end?
- Fires less than 250 km away that started since 2016 with a similar FWI, humidity and dry spell: 18. Their median duration was 5 days and their median area 2,872 ha; 100 % went past 1,000 ha. In 13 of 18, not even 1 mm fell in the ten days after the end: they went out without rain. In the rest, the first rainy day brought a median of 3.9 mm.
Where to verify it
A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.
Emergency number: 10177 · 112 · Emergency number and official warnings
Satellite cross-check
History of this page · 1 Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.
- Last day with fire: 26 August 2024 → 28 August 2024.
RSS Changes to this page With cross-checks and a citable version
Does something look wrong on this page?
This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.
Report an error
How we know this
- Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 24 August 2024 to 26 August 2024. 156 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
- Built-up area and population come from the JRC Global Human Settlement Layer (epoch 2025, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.
Where this data comes from
The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM3 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.