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Fires Spread in West U.S.
West U.S. was declared at the highest level of fire danger Wednesday as crews battled growing wildfires that had closed roads and threatened homes.
"We have gone to Level Five for fire danger," said David Widmark at the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland, which handles regional fire control. The decision was made Wednesday morning, Widmark said.
The military often is called in to supplement firefighting crews at Level Five. The alert status was raised to Level Four on Monday for only the first time this year by the Boise, Idaho Northwest Interagency Coordination Center.
Most fires in the West were started by lightning and spread quickly through parched land. The air is so dry across most of the region that rain never reaches the ground.
In Oregon, seven homes were evacuated during the night near the high desert town of Monument, where the National Guard already had been called out to help.
Twenty-seven homes were threatened in the town of about 150 people, prompting Gov. John Kitzhaber to declare a "state of conflagration." The order means any agencies that sends firefighters and gear to fight the fire will be reimbursed by the state.
The blaze was only 10% contained Wednesday morning.
Crews in Nevada said they had contained a 82,000-acre grass and brush fire 17 miles north of Battle Mountain and were turning their attention toward a nearby fire that was 25% contained at 11,000 acres. Fires have burned at least 200,000 acres in Nevada since last week.
But elsewhere in Nevada, the historic mining hamlet of Midas was still threatened by a group of fires that had blackened 30,000 acres and was only 10% contained.
And in northern California, crews fought Wednesday to keep a 31,000-acre fire, about 13 miles east of the town of Likely in Lassen County, from spreading to two small communities.
That fire was only 10% contained Wednesday morning and threatened Eagleville, a small community of about 100 people, and Jess Valley, with 50 residents, said Wayne Chandler, a fire information officer for Modoc National Forest. Full containment wasn't expected until Aug. 22, he said.
California's largest blaze, a range fire east of Ravendale, near the Nevada state line, had grown to 67,700 acres as of Wednesday morning, said Jeff Fontana, a spokesman for the Susanville Interagency Fire Center.
"We're hoping to announce this evening that the fire has been 100% contained," Fontana said.
In Washington, a fire had burned about 27,000 acres on the Colville Indian Reservation, destroying six homes and threatening 50 others, said Nick Mickel, a fire information officer.
Other homes and cabins in Washington were threatened by fires burning across thousands of acres of grass, sagebrush and timber scattered from the Cascade Range east to the Idaho border.
Officials closed off a seven-mile stretch of U.S. 97 in north-central Washington because a fire was burning toward the highway
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