Wildfire Update 2015

Check here for information on fires in our region. You can also check out these resources:Northwest Interagency Coordination CenterSWOFIRE: Oregon Department of Forestry, SW regionCalFire: Current Fire InformationInciWeb: Incident Information SystemOregon Smoke Blog: Smoke informationSouth Central Oregon Fire Management Cooperative (Klamath/Lake Counties & Crater Lake)

Firefighters Battle High Winds To Contain Oregon Wildfire

By Ashley Stewart

Published August 21, 2015 at 3:44 PM PDT

Members of structural protection Task Force #3 Lincoln watch fire activity on the afternoon of August 20 while staging in Seneca, Oregon.

As firefighters work to contain the Canyon Creek Complex wildfire, high winds and hot temperatures mean the fire keeps growing.

The fire has spread to more than 61,000 acres and firefighters are up against the weather to keep it from growing.

“Firefighters are doing pretty well as far as getting the line buttoned up, and they’re doing a lot of good work,” said fire information officer Vince Mazzier. “We’ll just see what happens this afternoon with the wind.”

That wind is what is giving firefighters trouble. They expect wind gusts to reach as much as 35 miles per hour.

“It does cause the fire to move in the direction of the wind, which is going to be somewhere out of the west to northwest, so that will push the southern end of the fire into the wilderness.”

So that’s where they’re working the hardest. A new fire started Thursday about 12 miles west in Prairie City. Fire officials are calling it the Jerry’s Draw Fire and don’t expect it to join with Canyon Creek.