Started on Sep 8, 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
- 16 miles north of Murdo, SD
- Cause
- Natural
- People working on it
- 74 people
- Complexity
- Type 4 IncidentOfficial scale from 5 to 1: a Type 1 is the most complex in the country.
- What's burning
- Tall Grass (2.5 feet)
- How it's behaving
- MinimalFlanking — Grows along the sides, not head-on.Backing — Moves against the wind or downhill, which makes it slower.
- 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 1,091 acres of private land in Jones County, South Dakota, the naturally caused Van Meter Fire has reached 100 percent containment after burning through tall grass averaging 2.5 feet in height. Located 16 miles north of Murdo, the incident was managed by a Type 4 Incident Command structure utilizing 74 personnel, bringing the total cost of operations to $40,000.
Satellites have detected eight heat signatures over the past 48 hours near the perimeter, while ground crews observed minimal, flanking, and backing fire behavior before achieving full containment. This event unfolds within a regional fire season that typically runs from June to October. Nationally, the broader context shows 3,195,047 hectares burned so far in 2026, tracking 42 percent below the two-decade average.
In context
This wildfire burned in South Dakota for 1 day. In total it burned about 1,091 acres — around 4.4 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 3,388,378 hectares have burned so far in 2026 — 38% 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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