Friday is the first day of autumn and with recent rains it looks like fire season is winding down.
But, hundreds of crews are still at work in Oregon shoring up fire lines. Carol Connolly is with the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland.
“We’ll continue to have fire crews and support personnel on many of these large fires for the next several weeks.” Connelly says, “Fire crews are wrapping up some of their suppression operations but there’s still a lot of work to be done. They have a huge investment into the communities that surround these fires so they’re going to be around to make sure that folks are very comfortable with how they leave these fires.”
Connolly says teams will eventually transfer firefighting responsibilities to local crews. She says warmer dryer weather is expected in the next couple weeks but it’s unlikely another major fire will be sparked. The Eagle Creek fire in the Columbia Gorge is still the top priority in the region.