How long did the Witzenberg fire last?

GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 February 2025 and 27 February 2025: 8 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 6,239 hectares (62.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.

Which municipalities burned?

The fire only entered Witzenberg (6,286 ha, 0.6 %).

What was the weather like?

During the fire the temperature reached 31.9 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, 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.

ZA · South Africa · 2025-02-20 → 2025-02-27

Witzenberg fire, February 2025 Witzenberg

Out · last detection 27 Feb 2025, 13:01 UTC

The fire started on 20 February 2025 in Witzenberg, South Africa, and satellites saw it burning for 8 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 6,239 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 57th largest in Western Cape since 2016 (of 164 with a page). Number 15 in South Africa in 2025, of 87.

Burnt area: 6,239ha; GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration: 8days; 20 Feb 2025 – 27 Feb 2025
Municipalities hit: 1; municipalities
Started on: 20 Feb; 2025
Heat detections: 326; in a single hotspot: 316 MW
Danger at start: 35; High · FWI index
Energy released: 6.3GW; sum of detected power

Play back 27 Feb 2025

HOTSPOTS BY DAY 20 Feb27 Feb

How it evolved, day by day

2021222324252627

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

The weather it burned in

32°high

53km/h · peak gust

27%lowest humidity

It had gone 19 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

Witzenberg where it started

6,286 ha reached on 20 Feb

0.6 %

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)
20 Feb	31.9 °C	27 %	44 km/h	0.0 mm	High 35
21 Feb	27.9 °C	38 %	45 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
22 Feb	26.0 °C	35 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
23 Feb	26.2 °C	34 %	37 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
24 Feb	27.7 °C	27 %	41 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29
25 Feb	26.2 °C	33 %	53 km/h	0.0 mm	High 33
26 Feb	30.2 °C	27 %	42 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
27 Feb	26.1 °C	40 %	33 km/h	0.0 mm	High 26
28 Feb after	24.4 °C	47 %	40 km/h	0.0 mm	High 24
1 Mar after	25.5 °C	39 %	44 km/h	0.2 mm	High 25
2 Mar after	30.9 °C	25 %	43 km/h	0.0 mm	High 32
3 Mar after	30.2 °C	33 %	38 km/h	0.2 mm	High 31
4 Mar after	27.8 °C	40 %	35 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
5 Mar after	27.3 °C	38 %	38 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
6 Mar after	26.3 °C	32 %	34 km/h	0.0 mm	High 28
7 Mar after	30.6 °C	25 %	32 km/h	0.0 mm	High 30
8 Mar after	30.3 °C	24 %	47 km/h	0.0 mm	High 36
9 Mar after	23.0 °C	42 %	46 km/h	0.0 mm	High 29

Before and after, from space

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

↔

Before · 13 Feb 2025

After · 6 Mar 2025

Before After

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 · Copernicus

On 27 February 2025 the air beside the fire reached 77 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 42: 2.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak77 µg/m³

Days over the guideline7 days

PM1078 µg/m³

Optical depth0.74

WHO 15

181920212223242526272812

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 · 326Every 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

All fires in South Africa ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Witzenberg fire last?: GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 20 February 2025 and 27 February 2025: 8 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 6,239 hectares (62.4 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?: The fire only entered Witzenberg (6,286 ha, 0.6 %).
What was the weather like?: During the fire the temperature reached 31.9 °C, humidity dropped to 27 % and gusts hit 53 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 35, 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

NASA FIRMS ↗
GWIS · Copernicus ↗

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

What do you think is wrong?

Dates or duration Place or towns Burned area Name It was not a wildfire Same fire as another page Something else

What really happened?

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 10177 · 112.

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.

Where it burned