Four more ODF fire protection districts have declared fire season, prompted by continuing warm, rainless weather. The Northeast Oregon District went into fire season June 26. The South Cascade and Western Lane districts did so on June 29, and the West Oregon District on July 3. The North Cascade District is set to enter fire season on Wednesday, July 5.
The last remaining district without a fire season start date – Northwest Oregon – is expected to announce later this week when it will enter fire season, possibly near the beginning of next week.
ODF’s meteorologists are forecasting continued dry weather over most of the state, with temperatures above average in most areas through the middle of July. Dry, warm summers such as we’re having may be normal in Oregon but they quickly dry out vegetation, snags and other woody debris. The longer summer conditions prevail, the greater the chance for lightning to not just spark a fire but for that fire to quickly spread into a major blaze.
Fire schools prepare firefighters for summer blazes
Firefighting agencies have been busy preparing with a number of different firefighter trainings around the state. The largest Fire School in Oregon just wrapped up last week. The Willamette Valley Interagency Wildland Fire School took place in Sweet Home. It concluded with a live-fire exercise on June 30. Some 250 firefighters and instructors from ODF, the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde set fire to slash piles in a 10-acre clearcut outside of town, then worked to extinguish the fires. The trainees practiced everything from digging fire containment lines to laying hose and spraying down embers as part of suppression and mop up. With increased lightning predicted for later in the week, they may soon get a chance to put those skills to work on actual wildfires.
(Photo above right: Mopping up operations on a slash pile burn at the Mid-Willamette Valley Interagency Wildland Fire School. Photo by Marcus Kauffman)
