Started on Sep 14, 2026.
United States todayLive
True view
Fire view
Fire view (right): infrared (SWIR), sees through smoke and brings out the heat.
🟢 green = vegetation
🟤 brown = already burned
🟠 orange = fire right now
Drag to compare: normal photo on the left, heat brought out on the right.
Green: vegetationBrown: already burnedOrange: fire right nowSentinel-2 · Copernicus
Red dots: heat detected by satellite in the last 48h. NASA FIRMS
Quick facts
- Location
- 2 miles northeast of Atoka, OK
- Cause
- Human
- People working on it
- 7 people
- Complexity
- Type 5 IncidentOfficial scale from 5 to 1: a Type 1 is the most complex in the country.
- What's burning
- Hardwood Litter
- How it's behaving
- MinimalCreeping — Moves slowly, hugging the ground.
- Jurisdiction
- Private land
Glossary: what each term means
Barely moving. Low, thin smoke.
Burning without flame, in the ground or in roots. Can flare up days later.
Moves slowly, hugging the ground.
Spreads with low, steady flames.
Spreading evenly and steadily, with visible flame.
Fast and unpredictable.
Runs along the ground much faster than a person walks.
Grows along the sides, not head-on.
Moves against the wind or downhill, which makes it slower.
Climbs into the treetops and jumps crown to crown. It can't be attacked from the ground.
Climbs into the crowns in bursts and drops back down.
Whole trees flaring up like torches.
Single scattered trees flaring up whole, like torches.
Whole clumps of trees flaring at once.
Wind carries embers through the air and starts new fires ahead of the front: that is how a fire jumps a road or a firebreak.
The wind pushes it in long runs in one direction.
The ones marked ● are the behaviors that make a fire harder to stop. They are not a warning or an instruction: they are the description written by the agency in charge. For decisions, always follow your emergency services.
Burning across private land in Atoka County, the Atoka Lake Fire has charred 727 acres since it started on September 14, 2026, advancing at an approximate average of 242 acres per day over its three-day burn. Located two miles northeast of Atoka, Oklahoma, the human-caused blaze is now fully contained at 100 percent.
Minimal, creeping fire behavior consumes hardwood litter as ground fuels, while satellites have detected two heat signatures over the past 48 hours, indicating the local extent of the remaining thermal activity. Fire suppression efforts are supported by a compact team of seven personnel operating under a Type 5 incident complexity and Type 3 incident command, with total suppression costs reaching $65,294.
This incident unfolds within a regional fire season that typically spans from June to October. On a national scale, the broader context reveals that 3,243,965 hectares have burned across the country so far in 2026, tracking 41% below the two-decade average.
In context
This wildfire burned in Oklahoma for 17 days. In total it burned about 727 acres — around 2.9 km².
In the Northern Hemisphere, wildfire activity usually peaks during the warm, dry months — roughly May through October.
The bigger picture in United States
Across United States, roughly 3,366,046 hectares have burned so far in 2026 — 39% below the two-decade average. Data from Copernicus GWIS.
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Community reports
Reports from people near the fire · unverified
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