A fire that started in August in the Willamette National Forest east of Eugene is still burning in the Three Sisters Wilderness. Officials have closed some areas until next summer for public safety.
The Terwilliger Fire burned along the Aufderheide Scenic Byway, also known as road 19, which leads to the popular Cougar Hot Springs. More than 8 miles of the road will remain closed because the slope is unstable due to the fire and an earlier landslide. Darren Cross is District Ranger for the McKenzie Ranger District.
“We also have a lot of dangerous trees that were burned and killed during the fire that are still along the trail to Terwilliger Hot springs and along that road and so we like to give those trees a winter to fall down on their own and lessen the chance that they might come down and hit somebody.”
Cross says the Terwilliger fire is 80 percent contained. They’ll allow it to smolder in the Three Sisters Wilderness as winter weather sets in.
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