Awatchfire

Lawrence County, South Dakota

Lookout Fire

Burning 2.2 miles east of North Spearfish and 2.6 miles north-west of Spearfish, since Monday 7 September.

Map of South Dakota. The Lookout Fire burns .
Where the fire is in the state.

444

acres burned so far — about 0.7 square miles

37

days burning so far

100%

of the perimeter held

The picture as of 10:09am today

The Lookout Fire is still listed as active, and has not been looked at lately. Nothing has given off fresh heat for 32 hours.

No fresh look at this fire for 32 hours. Everything on the map below was seen before then.

Shaded relief map of the Lookout Fire. Amber flames mark every place that gave off heat in the last day; the shading is the shape of the ground.
Heat in the last day Higher ground pale, valleys dark

32hours

since anything was last seen giving off heat — about 2:35am on Wednesday, local time.

0readings

of heat in the last day. There is not yet an earlier stretch of record to compare that against.

2.2miles

is how close the heat has come to North Spearfish at any point in the record. In the last day the nearest heat has been None miles from it, and the closest this fire has come to Spearfish is 1.9 miles, None in the last day.

2.3miles

is the furthest any heat has been seen from the point on the official record — the width of the ground involved so far.

Smoke has been recorded lying over this ground eight times so far. The thickest of it was moderate between 9:00am and 11:00am local time. The last of those windows closed 121 hours ago, so what is overhead now is not known.

Where the heat is

No cluster large enough to call a separate front. The heat is in one piece.

Conditions measured 13.7 miles from the fire: 40°F, air at 61% humidity, a 12 mph wind out of the north-west.

How it got here

Three days of record on a day-39 fire

The record here begins at 2:42pm on 7 Sep and runs to 2:37am on 14 Oct — 876 hours, 9 readings of heat. The fire is on day 39, so the first 36 days are missing: nothing showed up from above until the fire was large enough and the sky over it clear enough for it to be seen.

Animated map of the Lookout Fire across the whole record, with a time bar along the bottom showing energy released and the local date.
The whole record, 295 frames at 3 hours a frame. The bar along the bottom is energy released; the moving line is the clock.

Day by day 3 days of record

  1. Map for Mon 7 Sep: flames mark every place that gave off heat that day.

    Mon7 Sep

    First readings

    • 6 heat readings — the most of any day
    • Heat from 2:42pm to 4:08pm
    • Spread 0.5 miles from the recorded point at its furthest
    • Burning through the afternoon
  2. Map for Tue 8 Sep: flames mark every place that gave off heat that day.

    Tue8 Sep

    Cooling off

    • 2 heat readings
    • Energy 100% down on the day before
    • Heat from 2:58am to 2:58am
    • Spread 0.7 miles from the recorded point at its furthest
    • Burning through the pre-dawn
  3. Map for Wed 14 Oct: flames mark every place that gave off heat that day.

    Wed14 Octlatest

    Flaring up

    • 1 heat readings
    • Energy 2.0 times the day before
    • Heat from 2:37am to 2:37am
    • Spread 2.3 miles from the recorded point at its furthest
    • Burning through the pre-dawn

How the record has moved

Each step is a change on the interagency incident record — acreage, containment or crews — with the date it was reported. No satellite reading is involved.

  1. Monday 7 September

    First reported at 10 acres

    10 ac

  2. Monday 7 September

    40 acres on record

    40 ac

  3. Monday 7 September

    Grew to 300 acres

    300 ac

  4. Tuesday 8 September

    Grew to 444 acres — containment 0%, 157 personnel

    444 ac · 0% held · 157 crew

  5. Wednesday 9 September

    Containment 29% — 170 personnel

    444 ac · 29% held · 170 crew

  6. Thursday 10 September

    Containment 71% — 113 personnel

    444 ac · 71% held · 113 crew

  7. Sunday 13 September

    Containment 100% — 35 personnel

    444 ac · 100% held · 35 crew

100% of the perimeter is being reported as held. 35 people are assigned to it. It has grown from 10 acres when it was first written down to 444 now. Nothing has looked at it for 32 hours, and the record still lists it as active.