Remington Fire grows into the largest fire of the season while blazes continue in western Montana

Montana’s relatively modest 2024 fire season escalated quickly over the weekend with the rapid growth of the Remington Fire and an increase in fires across the state’s western half.

The Remington Fire is burning over more than 100,000 acres in southeast Montana, threatening to single-handedly double the total acreage burned so far in the state during the 2024 fire season. The fire was first reported on Thursday, Aug. 22, in Sheridan County, Wyoming. It now spans both states, though most of the fire’s roughly 196,000 acres are in Montana’s Powder River, Big Horn and Rosebud counties. A Complex Incident Management Team took command of firefighting operations on Monday morning.

Tessa Stetzer, a National Weather Service meteorologist based in Billings, ascribed some of the fire’s rapid growth to various climate phenomena. Fast-moving winds in the lower atmosphere picked up on Thursday and Friday nights when the nascent fire began spreading northward. The NWS extended a red flag warning — indicating low humidity, high temperatures, strong winds and increased thunderstorm activity — on Saturday as the fire continued to grow.

According to Public Information Officer Angsar Mitchell, the fire’s pace has since slowed because of effective fire lines and Monday’s intermittent precipitation.

“We’re not seeing the same fire behavior or conditions that warranted that fire growth a couple of days ago,” Mitchell said. The Remington Fire has already exhausted many faster-burning fuels, such as the short grass common in Montana’s southeast, according to Mitchell. 

Several new fires continue to burn across western Montana after Saturday’s thunderstorms sparked timber and brush on Forest Service and state park lands.

After the Sharrott Creek Fire was first reported roughly 20 miles north of Hamilton in the foothills of the Bitterroot National Forest on Sunday, the blaze grew to 1,000 acres. A Complex Incident Management Team is scheduled to assume command Tuesday morning. 

The Big Hollow Fire, now three days old, covers almost 3,450 acres of Beaverhead County along the border with Idaho. The fire is 40% contained. The Ratio Mountain Fire, first reported on Sunday, Aug. 18, burns 15 miles northwest of Whitehall, marking the area’s fourth fire in five years. Dead, dry, standing trees surround the fire’s 451 acres, posing risks for quick fire growth and hazards for responders. The McElwain Fire was first reported on Friday, Aug. 23, and is burning 176 acres several miles west of Helmville, with a small group of fire responders working to contain the blaze.

Aside from the Remington Fire, Montana’s southeastern fires pose little risk of fast growth. Rosebud County’s Chalky Point Fire grew from 500 to 1,200 acres during the weekend, though it is now 100% contained. In Big Horn County, the Barber Draw Fire is 75% contained at 6,739 acres. 

By Friday, the total acreage burned by wildfire during the 2024 Montana fire season had reached 130,000, surpassing the total acreage burned during the 2023 fire season. Even when responders release an official number for the Montana acreage burned by the Remington Fire, this year’s number is unlikely to break the five-year record of about 750,000 acres, a figure reached in 2021. 

More than 3.1 million acres of Montana, roughly 5,000 square miles, have been touched by wildfire in the last decade. Almost half of that area, roughly 43%, burned in 2017 alone. The summer of 2017 remains an example of fire season’s unpredictable timing. Two of that year’s most destructive fires, the Rice Ridge and Lolo Peak fires, continued to burn well into the early weeks of September.