Wildfire — Southern Lewis and Clark, Montana

2021-07-11 to 2021-07-31 · Southern Lewis and Clark, Montana

Event narrative

The Dry cabin Fire was a lightning caused incident located in the Scapegoat/Bob Marshall Wilderness area northwest of Lincoln. Steep terrain and heavy fuels allowed this fire to quickly grow in size and become a long term incident and was being managed by a type 3 team by the end of July. The fire size was 3,000 acres and was zero percent contained, but no structures were lost due to it's remote location.

Wider weather episode

Strong high pressure was the dominant weather pattern in July, which was occasionally suppressed by passing shortwaves and modest moisture for periods of scattered thunderstorms. Often times, the thunderstorm activity was followed by gusty winds and low relative humidity. Both lightning and human caused fires flourished in this environment.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 969742. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.