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NA · Namibia · –

Ndiyona fire, 3 September 2017 Ndiyona, Mashare

Out · last detection 11 Sept 2017, 11:37 UTC

The fire started on 3 September 2017 in Ndiyona, Namibia, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 2,675 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 210th largest in Kavango East since 2016 (of 332 with a page). Number 71 in Namibia in 2017, of 123.

Burnt area
2,675ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
9days
3 Sept 2017 – 11 Sept 2017
Municipalities hit
2
constituencies
Started on
3 Sept
2017
Heat detections
108
in a single hotspot: 0 MW
Danger at start
54
Extreme · FWI index
Average daily power
111MW
detected power per day, on average

Where it burned

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 3 Sept11 Sept
11 Sept 2017

How it evolved, day by day

3 Sept 2017 · 15 MW · 3 4 Sept 2017 · 229 MW · 21 5 Sept 2017 · 381 MW · 27 6 Sept 2017 · 134 MW · 19 7 Sept 2017 · 100 MW · 13 8 Sept 2017 · 90 MW · 17 9 Sept 2017 · 14 MW · 2 10 Sept 2017 · 24 MW · 3 11 Sept 2017 · 16 MW · 3
3 Sept 5 Sept 7 Sept 9 Sept 11 Sept

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

The weather it burned in

34°high
45km/h · peak gust
11%lowest humidity

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

This area had burned before

7% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 196 ha in 2016.

How big is it?

10 km
It burned the equivalent of 1.7% of the area of London (27 km² against 1,583 km²).

London boundary: geoBoundaries · Office for National Statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0).

This compares size, not location: both shapes are at the same scale, north up, centred on each other.

What happened to each town

  1. Ndiyona where it started
    1,527 ha
    0.2 %
  2. 1,158 ha
    0.1 %

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 2015
Built-up area< 0.1 ha
Residents< 20

Inside the perimeter there was no noticeable built-up land and almost nobody lived there (GHSL 2015, 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.

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: 88 % of the area in Namibia

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
3 Sept 31.0 °C 15 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
4 Sept 29.8 °C 19 % 45 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
5 Sept 31.2 °C 17 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 48
6 Sept 33.1 °C 16 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 46
7 Sept 33.7 °C 13 % 39 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
8 Sept 34.0 °C 12 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
9 Sept 33.9 °C 13 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
10 Sept 34.4 °C 13 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
11 Sept 33.9 °C 11 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
12 Sept after 33.7 °C 12 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
13 Sept after 33.9 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
14 Sept after 34.9 °C 10 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59
15 Sept after 34.8 °C 8 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 56
16 Sept after 35.6 °C 9 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
17 Sept after 36.2 °C 9 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 53
18 Sept after 36.3 °C 10 % 21 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
19 Sept after 36.5 °C 11 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
20 Sept after 35.8 °C 14 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
21 Sept after 34.8 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59

Its twins: fires that started in the same weather

It started with an FWI of 54.2, a minimum humidity of 15% and more than two months without rain. Fires in the area that started in weather like this since 2016: 33.

FWI at the start 54.2
Minimum humidity 15 %
Days without rain 60+
this fire chosen twins rest of the area
Almost identicalSimilar

Outlines of the closest twins

Mashare fire, September 2023
4,170 ha 5 days FWI 55.1 Min. humidity 14 % 32 km away, in 2023

First rain (1 mm or more) after it ended: none in the following ten days.

What happened to them

8 days
median duration
3,544 ha
median area
6 %
went past 10,000 ha
1.8 mm
rain at the end (median; 5 of 33 had it)

It burned an area similar to its twins (2,675 ha against a median of 3,544 ha) and lasted 9 days, against 8 days.

In 28 of 33, 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 1.8 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

—first rain
—no rain in ten days
45km/h · max. gust

It was considered over on 11 Sept, and not even 1 mm fell in the following ten days: it went out without rain. Twins with rain when they ended: 5 of 33, with a median of 1.8 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.

How we calculate it

Before and after, from space

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

Before · 27 Aug 2017
After · 18 Sept 2017

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 · 0Every 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 Namibia

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Ndiyona fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 3 September 2017 and 11 September 2017: 9 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 2,675 hectares (26.8 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Ndiyona (1,527 ha, 0.2 %); Mashare (1,158 ha, 0.1 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 34.4 °C, humidity dropped to 11 % and gusts hit 45 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 54, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Namibia (OCHA COD-AB). 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: 33. Their median duration was 8 days and their median area 3,544 ha; 6 % went past 10,000 ha. In 28 of 33, 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 1.8 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.

Satellite cross-check

History of this page Changes in area, dates, name, official record or merged pages, compared every night since 24 October 2026.

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
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How we know this
  • Perimeter: GWIS (Copernicus), rebuilt from heat detections rather than mapped on imagery.
  • Dates from the perimeter: the VIIRS detections inside it did not change them. No 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 2015, 100 m cells), summed inside the perimeter: an estimate of what was there, not a damage count.

How we build fire pages: methodology

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 OCHA COD-AB (Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA)) (Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-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.