Senqu fire, November 2019 Senqu, Walter Sisulu
The fire started on 28 November 2019 in Senqu, South Africa, and satellites saw it burning for 2 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,020 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.
It is the 102th largest in Eastern Cape since 2016 (of 185 with a page). Number 63 in South Africa in 2019, of 130.
The power measured by the satellite is low (18.9 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 3,020ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 2days
- 28 Nov 2019 – 29 Nov 2019
- Municipalities hit
- 2
- municipalities
- Started on
- 28 Nov
- 2019
- Heat detections
- 69
- in a single hotspot: 19 MW
- Danger at start
- 43
- Very high · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 407MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
28 Nov 2019 · 407 MW · 69
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 10 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started. Rain came after the fire: 22.6 mm on 3 Dec.
This area had burned before
3% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 90 ha in 2018.
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
-
Senqu where it started2,337 ha reached on 28 Nov0.3 %
-
704 ha reached on 28 Nov0.0 %
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) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28 Nov | 34.3 °C | 6 % | 36 km/h | 0.0 mm | Very high 43 |
| 29 Nov | 29.7 °C | 15 % | 66 km/h | 1.3 mm | High 36 |
| 30 Nov after | 31.4 °C | 11 % | 72 km/h | 0.8 mm | Extreme 50 |
| 1 Dec after | 27.5 °C | 31 % | 54 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 29 |
| 2 Dec after | 33.5 °C | 13 % | 70 km/h | 0.3 mm | Extreme 55 |
| 3 Dec after | 18.5 °C | 48 % | 58 km/h | 22.6 mm | Very low 1 |
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 · 69Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 8,006 haSenqu13 September 2022 · 4 days · 12 km away
- 6,765 haEmalahleniOctober 2021 · 3 days · 13 km away
- 6,483 haSenqu1 October 2024 · 5 days · 21 km away
- 4,754 haEmalahleniSeptember 2022 · 7 days · 26 km away
- 10,961 haWalter SisuluSeptember 2024 · 3 days · 29 km away
- 4,549 haEmalahleniJuly 2017 · 4 days · 29 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Senqu fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 28 November 2019 and 29 November 2019: 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 3,020 hectares (30.2 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire entered 2 municipalities: Senqu (2,337 ha, 0.3 %); Walter Sisulu (704 ha, 0.0 %).
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 34.3 °C, humidity dropped to 6 % and gusts hit 66 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 43, class Very 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.
Report an error
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. 69 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.
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.