Lower Brule, South Dakota
8 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1953 and the latest in 1985. It stands in the Lower Brule unorganized territory. It lies in ZIP code area 57548. It lies near Brule Island (historical). The Survey maps it on the Lower Brule quadrangle. 703 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,444 feet above sea level.
On record in Lower Brule
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 1 record
- Iron Nation's Gravesitelisted 2014
Population over time
2 figuresLower Brule grew from 613 to 703 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.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 613 | |
| 2020 | 703 | +90 (+15%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
4 surveys from 8 printed sheetsMatched 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.
- 1953 USGS Huron quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1954 USGS Huron quadrangle1:250000
- 1966 USGS Lower Brule quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
- 1985 USGS Big Bend Dam quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
767 since 1992Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 767 fires within 5 miles of Lower Brule between 1992 and 2020, burning about 1,792 acres in total. 21 started naturally. 70 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 |
|---|---|
| Fireworks | 258 |
| Misuse of fire by a minor | 183 |
| Debris and open burning | 96 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 70 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 58 |
| Smoking | 32 |
| Natural | 21 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 21 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 12 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 10 |
| Other causes | 6 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 September 1998 | Smoking | 2.0 acres | Lower Brule Agency | LOOKOUT |
| 8 September 2002 | Smoking | 1.0 acres | Lower Brule Agency | BARN |
| 7 September 2002 | Fireworks | under an acre | Lower Brule Agency | SUE |
| 7 September 2002 | Fireworks | under an acre | Lower Brule Agency | SANDY |
| 7 September 2002 | Misuse of fire by a minor | under an acre | Lower Brule Agency | BRANCH |
| 7 September 1998 | Misuse of fire by a minor | 1.0 acres | Lower Brule Agency | COURT |
| 6 September 2008 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Lower Brule Agency | TIRES |
| 6 September 1993 | Misuse of fire by a minor | under an acre | Lower Brule Agency | POND |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
45 since 1996Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Lower Brule in 45 storm reports between 1996 and 2025: 21 hail, 20 thunderstorm wind, 2 flash flood, 2 tornado. The reports record 2 deaths. 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.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 2011 | Flash Flood | Lower Brule | 2 killed | Very heavy rainfall of 5 to 7 inches brought flash flooding to mainly eastern Lyman county. Many roads were flooded with some washed out. Two women died in two separate vehicles after driving into a washed out portion of a road. One woman was found 100 yards downstream while the other woman was found 4 miles downstream. The accidents were believed to happen between 930 and 10 am. The location was 9 miles north of Reliance on BIA 10 just north of the intersection with Highway 47. |
| July 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | A trained spotter estimated the winds at 75 mph. |
| July 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | A peak wind gust of 80 mph was observed by the South Dakota State University mesonet station near Lower Brule. West Central Electric Cooperative reported multiple power outages due to broken poles and wires in and around Lower Brule. |
| August 2025 | Flash Flood | Lower Brule | - | A trained spotter reported water flowing over the roads in West Brule. |
| June 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | A South Dakota Mesonet weather station recorded a wind gust of 82 mph. |
| July 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | A trained spotter estimated 70 mph winds, which caused tree damage and downed powerlines. Solar panels were also damaged. |
| June 2022 | Tornado (EFU) | Lower Brule | - | A tornado was observed to be moving east-northeasterly for a short time before becoming rain-wrapped. |
| August 2019 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty mph winds were estimated. |
| August 2019 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | Tennis to baseball size hail damaged homes and vehicle windows. |
| August 2019 | Tornado (EF0) | Lower Brule | - | A tornado touched down briefly in an open area west of Lower Brule with no damage reported. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty mph winds were estimated. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Estimated seventy mph winds overturned several center pivots and flattened corn and beans. |
| August 2016 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty-five mph winds were estimated. |
| June 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Ninety mph winds flipped over a pickup truck, removed a large area of shingles on a roof, along with downing many large tree branches. |
| June 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | One-hundred mph winds or higher caused severe damage in Lower Brule to several buildings along with downing many trees. The roof of the courthouse also sustained damage along with pieces of art destroyed, like tepees at the tribal hall. Light poles at the football field were also bent over. The red cross set up shelter for displaced people. |
| June 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty mph winds downed an old weakened tree. |
| June 2014 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty-five mph winds brought down several tree branches. |
| June 2014 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Seventy mph winds brought down many branches. |
| August 2009 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | Sixty mph winds were esimated in Lower Brule. |
| July 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2025 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2023 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| August 2019 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2018 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| August 2018 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2017 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2017 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2017 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2017 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| May 2016 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2015 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| September 2005 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| September 2005 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| August 2004 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| August 2004 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| August 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| June 2000 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 1999 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
| July 1996 | Hail | Lower Brule | - | no account filed |
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.
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 Lower Brule | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2340613 | The 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 1256261. 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.



