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Sinai, South Dakota

9 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1953 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Lake Sinai Township. It lies in ZIP code area 57061. The Survey maps it on the Sinai quadrangle. 99 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,781 feet above sea level.

Sinai within Brookings County

Population over time

2 figures

Sinai fell from 120 to 99 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
2010120
202099-21 (-18%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

4 surveys from 9 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

1 since 2009

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Sinai in 2009, burning under an acre in total. None started naturally. 1 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
Arson/incendiarism1

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
29 July 2009Arson/incendiarismunder an acreMadison Wetland Management DistrictRAMSEY WF

Every fire recorded in Brookings County

Storms near this place

30 since 1996

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Sinai in 30 storm reports between 1996 and 2025: 16 hail, 9 thunderstorm wind, 2 tornado, 2 flood. 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
July 2002Thunderstorm WindSinai$3,000,000Thunderstorm winds caused widespread structural, tree, and power line damage in and near Sinai. The roof was ripped off a mobile home, a well drilling business was destroyed, the siding from another business was ripped off, part of a grain elevator was smashed, several garages were destroyed or heavily damaged, several trees were blown down and widespread tree debris littered the area, and power lines and poles were blown down. Power outages lasted until the next day. At a farm just east of Sinai, five grain bins, a machine shed, and several small shacks were destroyed, and the farmhouse was damaged, with about 300 thousand dollars in damage estimated at this farm alone. Other small farm structures in the area were reported to be destroyed or damaged. Crops in the area were heavily damaged by the wind and accompanying hail, with one witness watching as a bean field "just disappeared." The crop damage was widespread, but the amount of crop damage could not be determined.
September 2019FloodSinai$244,000Flooding resulted in damage to public infrastructure including county and township roads and culverts. Flooding also resulted in crop losses across the area. Crop loss estimates provided by the United States Department of Agriculture.
October 1997Thunderstorm WindSinai$100,000no account filed
June 2025Thunderstorm WindSinai-Several three-inch tree limbs were downed by thunderstorm wind gusts.
May 2022Tornado (EFU)Sinai-A tornado spun up over Lake Sinai, and dissipated before it reached shore. The tornado caused no damage from which the NWS could assign an EF-scale rating. The average path width was estimated to be 30 yards.
August 2021Thunderstorm WindSinai-Thunderstorm winds downed several trees in the Lake Sinai area.
June 2019FloodSinai-During crop planting season, prolonged flooding led to the loss of or inability to plant crops across the area. Crop loss estimates provided by the United States Department of Agriculture.
May 2017Thunderstorm WindSinai-Severe large branches downed.
May 2017Thunderstorm WindSinai-Several branches were downed, some as large as three inches in diameter.
May 2017Thunderstorm WindSinai-Large, seven inch tree branches were downed.
May 2011HailSinai-Nickel size hail whitened the ground.
September 2005HailSinai-Large hail covered the ground and was accompanied by estimated 50 mph winds. The hail damaged a home and area crops, but the amount of damage was not known.
May 2002Flash FloodSinai-Several roads were under water after heavy rain.
July 2002Tornado (F0)Sinai-A tornado caused no reported damage.
July 2002HailSinai-Large hail, accompanied by 50 mph winds, caused crop damage. The amount of crop damage was not known.
July 2023HailSinai-no account filed
July 2023HailSinai-no account filed
May 2014HailSinai-no account filed
May 2011HailSinai-no account filed
June 2009HailSinai-no account filed
June 2006HailSinai-no account filed
June 2006HailSinai-no account filed
June 2006Thunderstorm WindSinai-no account filed
June 2005HailSinai-no account filed
April 2004HailSinai-no account filed
May 2004HailSinai-no account filed
May 2000Thunderstorm WindSinai-no account filed
July 2000HailSinai-no account filed
September 1997HailSinai-no account filed
June 1996HailSinai-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Brookings 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
Ahnberg4.2 miles9
Volga8.2 miles8
Sheldon Trailor Town12.0 miles9
Brookings13.7 miles9
Medary13.7 miles11
Sunnyview15.2 miles9
Bruce15.6 miles8
North Grove Addition18.6 miles9

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 SinaiAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q568314The 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 1258080. 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.