Devil's Broom fire

Great Fire of 1910
Little North Fork of the St. Joe River, Idaho
Location	Northeast Washington, North Idaho, Northwest Montana, U.S.
Statistics
Date(s)	August 20–21, 1910
Burned area	3,000,000 acres (4,700 sq mi; 12,100 km2)
Cause	not officially determined
Land use	logging, mining, railroads
Fatalities	87

The Great Fire of 1910 (also commonly referred to as the Big Blowup, the Big Burn, or the Devil's Broom fire) was a wildfire in the western United States that burned about three million acres (4,700 sq mi; 12,100 km²) in northeast Washington, northern Idaho, and western Montana.

The area burned included parts of the Bitterroot, Cabinet, Clearwater, Coeur d'Alene, Flathead, Kaniksu, Kootenai, Lewis and Clark, Lolo, and St. Joe National Forests. The firestorm burned over two days, August 20–21, and killed 87 people, mostly firefighters. It is believed to be the largest, although not the deadliest, forest fire in U.S. history. The outcome was to highlight firefighters as public heroes while raising public awareness surrounding national nature conservation. The extensive burned area was approximately the size of the state of Connecticut.

There were a great number of problems that contributed to the destruction caused by the Great Fire of 1910. The fire season started early that year, because the spring and summer of 1910 were extremely dry and the summer sufficiently hot to have been described as "like no others." The drought resulted in forests that were teeming with dry fuel, which had previously grown up on abundant autumn and winter moisture. Fires were set by hot cinders flung from locomotives, sparks, lightning, and backfiring crews, and by mid-August, there were 1,000 to 3,000 fires burning in Idaho, Montana, Washington, and British Columbia.