Started on Jul 31, 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
- 6 miles south of Ely, NV
- Cause
- Natural
- People working on it
- 2 people
- Complexity
- Type 1 IncidentOfficial scale from 5 to 1: a Type 1 is the most complex in the country.
- What's burning
- Timber (Litter and Understory)
- How it's behaving
- MinimalSmoldering — Burning without flame, in the ground or in roots. Can flare up days later.Creeping — Moves slowly, hugging the ground.Isolated Torching — Single scattered trees flaring up whole, like torches.
- Jurisdiction
- USFS · Federal 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 timber with litter and understory, the 8,683-acre Ward Fire near Ely, Nevada, in White Pine County, has reached full containment after a grueling 26-day campaign. Pushing outward at an average daily growth of approximately 334 acres per day, the natural-cause federal wildfire managed by the USFS required the deployment of a Type 1 Incident complexity level, a Type 4 Incident Commander, and a dedicated response force of two personnel, ultimately accumulating $14,600,000 in costs.
With containment now secure at 100 percent, current fire behavior on the landscape is characterized as minimal, smoldering, creeping, and showing only isolated torching.
This incident unfolded within the region's typical fire season, which runs from June to October. Nationally, the broader context reveals that 3,021,962 hectares have burned so far in 2026, marking a figure 45 percent below the two-decade average.
In context
This wildfire burned in Nevada for 40 days. In total it burned about 8,683 acres — around 35 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 3,243,965 hectares have burned so far in 2026 — 41% 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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Not official emergency information. In an emergency, contact fire services/authorities.
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