Impendle fire, September 2022 Impendle, Mpofana, Inkosi Langalibalele
The fire started on 5 September 2022 in Impendle, South Africa, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,461 hectares from heat detections, spread across 3 municipalities.
It is the 52th largest in KwaZulu-Natal since 2016 (of 171 with a page). Number 59 in South Africa in 2022, of 143.
- Burnt area
- 3,461ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 2days
- 5 Sept 2022 – 6 Sept 2022
- Municipalities hit
- 3
- municipalities
- Started on
- 5 Sept
- 2022
- Heat detections
- 134
- in a single hotspot: 87 MW
- Danger at start
- 32
- High · FWI index
- Energy released
- 1.7GW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 5 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 4.9 mm on 12 Sept.
This area had burned before
97% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,081 ha in 2016, 192 ha in 2017, 3,079 ha in 2019, 490 ha in 2020, 329 ha in 2021. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 3,370 ha that had burned before.
- 3,079 ha Impendle fire, September 2019 8,607 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 461 ha Inkosi Langalibalele fire, July 2020 8,310 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 326 ha Impendle fire, July 2021 2,212 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 192 ha Impendle fire, June 2017 4,254 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 28 ha Impendle fire, July 2020 9,087 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 3 ha Inkosi Langalibalele fire, July 2021 5,535 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Impendle where it started3,273 ha reached on 5 Sept2.0 %
-
188 ha reached on 5 Sept0.1 %
-
7 ha0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 Sept | 22.1 °C | 4 % | 50 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
| 6 Sept | 16.4 °C | 43 % | 35 km/h | 0.8 mm | Moderate 12 |
| 7 Sept after | 20.5 °C | 27 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 14 |
| 8 Sept after | 23.3 °C | 18 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 9 Sept after | 23.4 °C | 21 % | 44 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 24 |
| 10 Sept after | 25.0 °C | 13 % | 48 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 11 Sept after | 23.8 °C | 17 % | 44 km/h | 0.3 mm | High 26 |
| 12 Sept after | 8.1 °C | 89 % | 29 km/h | 4.9 mm | Very low 0 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
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 · 134Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 8,607 haImpendleSeptember 2019 · 4 days · 2 km away
- 9,087 haImpendle18 July 2020 · 4 days · 7 km away
- 8,310 haInkosi Langalibalele15 July 2020 · 4 days · 9 km away
- 5,429 haImpendle23 July 2020 · 4 days · 11 km away
- 5,535 haInkosi Langalibalele27 July 2021 · 2 days · 13 km away
- 5,940 haInkosi LangalibaleleJuly 2019 · 2 days · 26 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Impendle fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 5 September 2022 and 6 September 2022: 2 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 3,461 hectares (34.6 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 3 municipalities: Impendle (3,273 ha, 2.0 %); Mpofana (188 ha, 0.1 %); Inkosi Langalibalele (7 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 22.1 °C, humidity dropped to 4 % and gusts hit 50 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 32, class High.
- 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.
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
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 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.