Hot weather, rainless summer: a timeline of fire season

June 27: During an ongoing heat spell, the temperature in Kalispell hits 97 degrees, marking the hottest June day on record. The Glacier Rim Fire breaks out in the North Fork.

June 28: Kalispell’s temperature hits 102 degrees, breaking the record set the day before. The high in Libby was 108.

July 2: Citing historically hot, dry conditions, the Flathead County commissioners unanimously vote to ban fireworks, two days after fireworks bans in Lake, Lincoln and Missoula counties.

July 7: Measurable rain falls in Flathead County for the first time in 33 days.

July 21: The Reynolds Creek Fire breaks out along Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park.

Aug. 9: The Thompson Fire in Glacier National Park is reported.

Aug. 11: An inversion lifts on the Thompson Fire and the fire explodes from 1,900 to 11,400 acres, sending a massive smoke plume 40,000 feet into the sky. The Marston Fire flares up to the northeast of Murphy Lake.

Aug. 16: Gov. Steve Bullock declares a national fire emergency in Montana, freeing up firefighting personnel and resources from the National Guard.

Aug. 19: Wildfires on the west side of Kootenai National Forest cause officials to evacuate residents near Noxon and Heron.

Aug. 20: Officials temporarily close U.S. 2 and the BNSF rail line near Essex as the Sheep Fire threatens the corridor between Glacier Park and the Great Bear Wilderness.

Aug. 20: The Bear Creek Fire near Spotted Bear grows from 465 acres to 17,755 acres in several hours. It became Montana’s largest single fire this year.

Aug. 27: The county evacuates the community of Essex, with conditions ripe for the Sheep Fire to advance toward residences and businesses in the area.

Aug. 29: The Goat Rocks Complex of fires prompts evacuations for several neighborhoods in south Libby. The evacuations are lifted the following day.

Aug. 31: Essex residents are allowed to return to their homes.

Sept. 28: Fire season continues with a new, 100-acre fire in the Mission Mountains Wilderness.

Oct. 24: Hunting season opens amid warnings from state and federal officials that conditions are dry enough for “warming fires” to become wildfires.

Oct. 29-31: Significant rain and high-elevation snow sweeps through the region in what fire officials finally deem a “season-ending event.”