‘The most extreme you can find:’ Bootleg Fire explodes, police arrest people in evacuation zone

Statesman Journal – by Zach Urness

The Bootleg Fire burning in southern Oregon exploded for the fifth day in a row Saturday afternoon, leading to the rare step of police citing and arresting people attempting to enter or stay in the evacuation zone northeast of Klamath Falls.

The fire was mapped at 143,607 acres Sunday morning after massive smoke plumes brought life-threatening risk and hazardous air quality across southern Oregon on Friday, according to fire crews. Pictures from the area showed darkened skies similar to those witnessed during last September’s Labor Day Fires.  

Conditions aren’t expected to improve, with the National Weather Service in Medford warning of yet another day of explosive growth given temperatures near 100 and in extreme drought.

“The fire behavior we are seeing on the Bootleg Fire is among the most extreme you can find and firefighters are seeing conditions they have never seen before,” fire incident commander Al Lawson said.

“Conditions today were so extreme that firefighters needed to disengage and move to predetermined safety zones,” he added. “Fire managers evaluated conditions and looked for opportunities to reengage firefighters safely.”

Fire conditions became so unsafe that the Klamath County Sheriff’s Office said it took the rare step of “citing or arresting those who remained in or were trying to re-enter the Level 3 evacuation areas in the Bootleg Fire Area,” the agency said in a news release.

“We understand the frustration of the community as the fire continues to grow,” the Sheriff’s Office said. “We also need to ensure our firefighters are able to engage safely so that they can return home at the end of this assignment to their families.”

The current evacuation map can be seen here, and is likely to expand, officials said. A map of all wildfires and smoke in Oregon can be found here.

Meteorologist said they didn’t expect smoke from Bootleg to impact the Willamette Valley or northwest Oregon over the weekend, although that could change by early next week. Southern Oregon, however, was already seeing decreased air quality, including unhealthy air at Crater Lake National Park and a lake that appeared shrouded in smoke.

Firefighters will get little relief from the weather, which is expected to remain in upper 90s to 100s through the middle of next week.

The fire behavior is so extreme there is fear of the fire creating a pyro-cumulus cloud that can create its own weather and could include lightning strikes and wind in an area suffering from extreme drought.

In addition to homes in the fire’s path, the blaze is also heading toward landmarks such as Summer Lake and the Gearhart Mountain Wilderness.