MISSOULA — Beyond those on the landscape, fire seasons themselves can leave scars.
Some moments of Montana’s 2024 wildfire season — which ravaged nearly 388,000 acres — will be burned into memories all across the state.
This year, fire season got off to a relatively quiet start, potentially because of May moisture. Unfortunately, that did not last long.
The biggest of the early season, the Horse Gulch Fire, took off in early July. It claimed nearly 15,000 acres northeast of Helena and the life of a pilot, Juliana Turchetti, who passed away while collecting water to fight the blaze.
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By mid-July, Southeastern Montana lit up. Dry lightning sparked the Deadman, McGhee, Prairie and Four Mile Fires, which, combined, burned almost 48,000 acres.
In Western Montana, blazes came for the Bitterroot. Just days later, the Miller Peak Fire sprang up seven miles from Missoula, burning about 2,700 acres.
On July 25, lightning ignited the Johnson Fire, which took out more than 8,000 acres outside of Sula. These were followed by the Railroad-Daly Fires, which reached more than 12,800 acres along the Skalkaho Highway southeast of Hamilton.
On August 23, more lightning started the Sharrott Creek Fire. Just three miles from Stevensville, the fire kept pouring smoke into the valley into early October.
The biggest fire of the season, the Remington Fire, crossed into Southeastern Montana from Sheridan County, Wyoming in late August.
After starting on August 22, the fire quickly hopped the border into Montana’s Powder River, Big Horn and Rosebud counties, while also impacting the Northern Cheyenne Reservation and the Custer National Forest. It burned more than 196,000 acres before it was contained in mid-September.
While not even close to Montana’s worst in the past decade, the 2024 season brought intense smoke and burned more acreage than 2022 and 2023 combined. That is likely connected to the intense dry conditions facing much of the state.
For the fifth consecutive year, much of Montana saw drought. According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data from mid-December, virtually all but the far northwestern corner of the state is contending with some form of drought. This includes “extreme” drought near Missoula and in Southeastern Montana.
But, looking ahead to the first three months of 2025, they predict improved conditions for most of Montana.
