United States Waterfall UNESCO World Heritage
Firehole Falls
One of the waterfalls of United States.
In numbers.
7.5m³/s
Average flow
estimate
May–Jun
Best months
2,124m
Elevation
The water at Firehole Falls, month by month
It roars from April to May.
The fullest months: from April to May, with the snowmelt. The thinnest: from August to October and from December to February. Below −4 °C on average (from November to March): the falls can partly freeze.
- 1.8 m³/sJan
- 2.6 m³/sFeb
- 8.9 m³/sMar
- 23 m³/sApr
- 25 m³/sMay
- 17 m³/sJun
- 7.2 m³/sJul
- 3.2 m³/sAug
- 3.1 m³/sSep
- 4.0 m³/sOct
- 6.5 m³/sNov
- 4.9 m³/sDec
From about 1.8 m³/s in the lowest month to 25 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from May to June.
Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.
Waterfall on the Firehole River in Yellowstone National Park
Firehole Falls is a waterfall in United States. It lies within Yellowstone National Park. It is part of a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Getting there.
- West Yellowstonenearest town · 19 km in a straight line
- Parking 80 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
- Yellowstone Airport (WYS)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 21 km in a straight lineCar hire at BZN airport (Bozeman)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- From May to Junebest months to go (estimate)
Plan your visit
Stay, explore and get there
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
Seen from the sky.
8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.
N
2 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.
Around the falls the river drops 87 m in 3.6 km. Here the river runs about 43 m below the lower rim of its valley.
What is around.
- —viewpoints
- 2waymarked walking routesHarlequin Lake Trail, Purple Mountain Trail
- 13car parks
- —swimming spots
- 16picnic sites
- 16toilets
- 1information boards and visitor centres
- —bus stops within 1 km
- 1other named waterfalls within 4 kmCascades of the Firehole
- —caves
- 1campsitesMadison Campground
- —hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 km
- —restaurants and cafés within 3 km
Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).
Towns nearby
- West Yellowstone19 km in a straight line
Weather
The weather, month by month.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Afternoon °C | -5 | -4 | 0 | 4 | 12 | 18 | 24 | 24 | 18 | 8 | 0 | -5 |
| Night °C | -15 | -15 | -10 | -6 | 0 | 5 | 10 | 9 | 4 | -3 | -10 | -15 |
| Rain & snow (mm) | 81 | 75 | 77 | 82 | 81 | 70 | 37 | 40 | 52 | 69 | 79 | 91 |
| Wet days | 18 | 16 | 17 | 17 | 18 | 15 | 11 | 11 | 10 | 13 | 15 | 18 |
| Sun h/day | 4.1 | 5.6 | 6.5 | 8.0 | 8.1 | 10.1 | 12.1 | 10.3 | 8.4 | 5.5 | 3.9 | 3.2 |
| Snow on the ground (cm) | 69 | 84 | 81 | 42 | 13 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 12 | 20 | 42 |
Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (2,124 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.
Photos
Through visitors' eyes.
Recent years
Wet years and dry years
Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 109% | 90% | 113% | 81% | 109% | 157% | 89% | 47% | 59% | 98% | 98% | 41% |
| 2021 | 66% | 97% | 45% | 34% | 105% | 11% | 86% | 181% | 46% | 87% | 58% | 111% |
| 2022 | 46% | 20% | 33% | 91% | 132% | 130% | 38% | 131% | 94% | 73% | 102% | 91% |
| 2023 | 54% | 86% | 125% | 63% | 63% | 167% | 67% | 248% | 119% | 118% | 50% | 56% |
| 2024 | 59% | 115% | 131% | 66% | 90% | 56% | 66% | 105% | 113% | 37% | 56% | 72% |
| 2025 | 53% | 147% | 89% | 67% | 74% | 51% | 70% | 111% | 73% | 128% | 37% | 179% |
130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual
Compare with the waterfalls nearby.
Firehole Falls
United States
- —Height
- 7.5 m³/sAverage flow
- May–JunBest months
About these numbers
| Names, height, width, river | Wikidata (Q38067) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| River flow and catchment | HydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 |
| Relief, river profile, 3D model | Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA |
| Paths, viewpoints, parking | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
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