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Gemsbok fire, 3 September 2021 Gemsbok

Out · last detection 6 Sept 2021, 22:50 UTC

The fire started on 3 September 2021 in Gemsbok, Botswana, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,468 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 80th largest in Kgalagadi since 2016 (of 423 with a page). Number 85 in Botswana in 2021, of 406.

Burnt area
8,468ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
3 Sept 2021 – 6 Sept 2021
Municipalities hit
1
subdistricts
Started on
3 Sept
2021
Heat detections
315
in a single hotspot: 32 MW
Danger at start
68
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.9GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

6 Sept 2021
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Sept6 Sept

How it evolved, day by day

3456

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

30°high
40km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone more than two months without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

10% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 887 ha in 2017.

What happened to each town

  1. Gemsbok where it started
    8,497 ha reached on 3 Sept
    0.3 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

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)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
3 Sept 29.2 °C 12 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
4 Sept 29.8 °C 12 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 65
5 Sept 29.1 °C 13 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
6 Sept 24.3 °C 16 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 57
7 Sept after 23.1 °C 7 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
8 Sept after 27.4 °C 8 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
9 Sept after 32.3 °C 15 % 51 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 71
10 Sept after 31.6 °C 23 % 58 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 74
11 Sept after 31.0 °C 9 % 55 km/h 0.0 mm Very extreme 80
12 Sept after 31.1 °C 8 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
13 Sept after 33.7 °C 11 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 68
14 Sept after 32.8 °C 11 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 66
15 Sept after 25.2 °C 17 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
16 Sept after 22.6 °C 13 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 27 Aug 2021
After · 13 Sept 2021

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 315Every 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 timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Botswana ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Gemsbok fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 September 2021 and 6 September 2021: 4 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 8,468 hectares (84.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Gemsbok (8,497 ha, 0.3 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 29.8 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 40 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 68, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Botswana (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

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.

Satellite cross-check

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.

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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 ADM2 (Public Domain). 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.