Onaka, South Dakota
9 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1950 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Sherman Township. It lies in ZIP code area 57466. The Survey maps it on the Onaka quadrangle. 13 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,873 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresOnaka fell from 15 to 13 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 | 15 | |
| 2020 | 13 | -2 (-13%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
6 surveys from 9 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.
- 1950 USGS Onaka quadrangle1:24000
- 1952 USGS Onaka quadrangle1:24000
- 1954 USGS Aberdeen quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1956 USGS Aberdeen quadrangle1:250000
- 1965 USGS Onaka quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Gettysburg quadrangle1:100000, 3 printings
Fires near this place
4 since 2006Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 4 fires within 5 miles of Onaka between 2006 and 2020, burning about 356 acres in total. 2 started naturally. None was 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 |
|---|---|
| Natural | 2 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 1 |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 July 2006 | Natural | 250 acres | South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression | not named |
| 16 July 2006 | Natural | 5.0 acres | Sand Lake National Wildlife Refuge | WALDMAN FIRE |
| 5 November 2020 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression | UNKNOWN |
| 11 October 2015 | Equipment and vehicle use | 100 acres | South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression | RICK RAUSCH |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
40 since 1997Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Onaka in 40 storm reports between 1997 and 2024: 21 hail, 9 flood, 6 thunderstorm wind, 2 tornado. 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.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 2023 | Flood | Onaka | $150,000 | no account filed |
| April 2019 | Flood | Onaka | $121,100 | no account filed |
| June 2024 | Tornado (EF0) | Onaka | - | A tornado briefly touched down in a field, and was later confirmed by satellite. |
| June 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | Winds were estimated to be between 50 and 60 mph, the timing of which was based on radar. |
| March 2019 | Flood | Onaka | - | Several county and township roads were flooded. |
| July 2019 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | Estimated seventy mph winds tore many shingles off the roof. |
| July 2018 | Hail | Onaka | - | Quarter hail damaged the bean crop and peeled paint of a building. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | Estimated one-hundred mph winds knocked over a concrete grain silo, totaled a pole barn, and caused extensive tree damage. |
| June 2005 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | Winds to 100 mph caused damage to trees and structures in around Onaka. The Onaka city hall was destroyed. |
| July 2001 | Tornado (F0) | Onaka | - | A tornado touched down northwest of Onaka traveling through a field. The tornado only caused some tree damage. Path length and width were estimated. |
| June 2019 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| August 2019 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| May 2019 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| March 2011 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| April 2011 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2011 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| March 2010 | Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2009 | Flash Flood | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2008 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2008 | Funnel Cloud | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| August 2006 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| August 2002 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2001 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| July 2001 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2000 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 2000 | Hail | Onaka | - | no account filed |
| June 1997 | Hail | Onaka | - | 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.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brentwood Colony | 9.2 miles | 7 | |
| Seneca | 9.4 miles | 7 | |
| Thunderbird Colony | 10.6 miles | 7 | |
| Burkmere | 12.9 miles | 7 | |
| Norbeck | 13.5 miles | 7 | |
| Millard | 14.7 miles | 7 | |
| Blumengard Colony | 16.1 miles | 7 | |
| Wecota | 18.5 miles | 8 |
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 Onaka | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2478093 | 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 1256895. 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.





