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West Glacier, Montana

14 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1914 and the latest in 1994. It stands in the Glacier National Park census division. It lies in ZIP code area 59936. It lies near John F Stevens Canyon. The Survey maps it on the West Glacier quadrangle. 221 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 3,215 feet above sea level.

West Glacier within Flathead County

On record in West Glacier

Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.

On the National Register 12 of 57 shown

Every listing in Flathead County

Population over time

2 figures

West Glacier fell from 227 to 221 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

YearPeople Change
2010227
2020221-6 (-3%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

7 surveys from 14 printed sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

Fires near this place

45 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 45 fires within 5 miles of West Glacier between 1992 and 2020, burning about 747 acres in total. 6 started naturally. 2 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause Fires
Recreation and ceremony10
Smoking6
Natural6
Missing data/not specified/undetermined5
Railroad operations and maintenance5
Debris and open burning3
Misuse of fire by a minor3
Fireworks3
Arson/incendiarism2
Power generation/transmission/distribution1
Other causes1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
5 September 2003Arson/incendiarism1.0 acresFlathead National ForestBED AND BREAKFAST
4 September 2005Power generation/transmission/distributionunder an acreFlathead National ForestPOWERLINE FIRE
11 September 1992Smokingunder an acreGlacier National ParkINSIDE
8 August 2017Naturalunder an acreGlacier National ParkSNYDER
8 August 2009Naturalunder an acreGlacier National ParkLIME SPRINGS
8 August 2006Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreGlacier National ParkMCDONALD CREEK
6 August 2017Fireworksunder an acreBlackfeet AgencyDUMP ROAD
31 August 2016Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreFlathead National ForestBELTON

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Flathead County

Storms near this place

9 since 2004

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names West Glacier in 9 storm reports between 2004 and 2015: 2 hail, 2 thunderstorm wind, 2 flood, 2 heavy rain. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
November 2006Flash FloodWest Glacier$7,000,000The Associated Press reported 7.0 million in damages. Glacier National Park received 9.1 of rainfall in 36 hours. An additional .5 to 1.0 million in damages occurred to the park's trails.
February 2015Heavy RainWest Glacier-A rockslide was reported along US-2 just east of West Glacier, MT. The eastbound lane was blocked by softball-sized rocks. Road crews cleared debris and the road was usable again an hour later.
July 2014Heavy RainWest Glacier-The Glacier National Park RAWS reported 0.76 of rainfall in one hour. Other heavy rainfall reports include 0.78 40 min. ending 4:10 pm MDT 3 miles east of Creston and 0.65 in one hour via Hungry Horse RAWS at 6:11 pm MDT.
May 2013FloodWest Glacier-Minor flooding occurred to agricultural lands in the low lying areas adjacent to the middle fork of the Flathead River near West Glacier.
July 2006Thunderstorm WindWest Glacier-no account filed
July 2006Thunderstorm WindWest Glacier-no account filed
May 2006FloodWest Glacier-no account filed
June 2006HailWest Glacier-no account filed
September 2004HailWest Glacier-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Flathead County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
Apgar2.1 miles24
Coram6.7 miles12
Martin City8.1 miles12
Hungry Horse9.0 miles12
Nyack10.1 miles13
Lake McDonald10.1 miles24
Crystal Ford10.2 miles24
South Fork (historical)10.7 miles11

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on West GlacierAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q2841651The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 793105. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.