By ZACH URNESS/Salem Statesman Journal
The vast majority of Oregon is at high or extreme wildfire risk heading into the year’s hottest month as the state nears a modern record for the most acres burned in a season.
The National Interagency Fire Center classified every part of Oregon, except the northwest, at elevated risk for wildfire in August and September in its latest forecast.
State climatologist Larry O’Neill said the only part of Oregon at normal fire danger was the Coast Range and Oregon Coast.
“That’s the one part of the state that’s close to normal, but besides that, we’re basically holding on for dear life everywhere else in Oregon,” he said. “We’re not really expecting any significant rain until about mid-September, so the hope is that things just stay stable.”
By stable, O’Neill said he was hoping for no more significant lightning storms that bring new fires, no major human-caused fires and especially no east winds.
East winds are Oregon’s greatest wildfire threat because they’re hot and dry and cause already-burning fires to explode. The major wildfire disasters in recent years, in 2020 and 2022, were caused by east winds and tend to reach peak danger in early September.
Oregon has seen 1.38 million acres burn so far this season, which is just short of the modern record of 1.53 million acres burned, set in 2012.
Much of the acres burned this season have come from megafires such as the Falls Fire (146,250 acres), the Cow Valley Fire (133,490 acres), Lone Rock Fire (137,222 acres) and Battle Mountain Complex (181,941 acres).
The modern era is considered to have begun in 1992. There were plenty of large wildfires before that, but tracking total acres burned was difficult statewide, officials have said.
- Zach Urness has been an outdoors reporter in Oregon for 16 years and is host of the Explore Oregon Podcast. He can be reached at zurness@StatesmanJournal.com or (503) 399-6801. Find him on X at @ZachsORoutdoors.
We’re not immune here on the coast. I’ve noticed over the last decade the dying off of the inside (the greenery of the limbs) of trees, with the green tips left to make things still look green, until that’s gone too, and also the marked increase in lichens and mosses, all of which mean that those trees are mostly tinder can go up in a heartbeat if exposed to flying embers. I believe this is going on all over the state, and that is why our forests are burning up so much. I’ve heard it said it’s because we’re so dry, or some types of beetles, I’m not convinced that is what’s going on as the reality is I see it in so many types of trees, and they all seems to be having issues with dying off inside to the point that they’d make easy fire potential. I can’t seem to get people to listen, but haven’t other people noticed?