Single Publication

Fire Size: 1,969 acres
Containment: 0%
Total Personnel: 403

Weather and Fire Behavior:
Light rain is forecasted through today, amounting to approximately 0.5 inches with a 50% chance of continued showers tomorrow. Relative humidity continues to be high, ranging from 60-70% through tomorrow. The light westerly wind is expected to continue throughout the week.

The fire is continuing to smolder and creep along moss and forest duff, with layers of the duff reaching six to eight feet deep. Pockets of flames can be seen in areas where the terrain is steep or exposed to more sun and wind. Fire weakened trees and snags continue to be a major hazard for firefighters when they fall suddenly and without warning.

Operations:
On the north flank crews have strategically burned small pockets of vegetation between Forest Road 12 and the fire’s edge. This will reduce the amount of available fire fuels along the fire’s perimeter to work towards containment of the fire. Today, crews will be working to create a dozerline and handlines along the northeast corner to the west edge of the fire in order to mitigate for fire spread in upper end of Camp Creek.

Because of more favorable weather conditions, air resources were able fly the fire starting around 2 p.m. yesterday. However, in the afternoon, aircraft were grounded due to a report of an unapproved drone flying in the Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) area of the fire. They continued operations once the airspace was determined safe for pilots to fly.

Remote water sampling equipment suggests that a small amount of fire retardant entered into a tributary of Bull Creek during initial attack operations on August 25th.  Detection levels were very low and have declined back to normal as stream flow and additional precipitation diluted the water. Portland Water Bureau and Mt. Hood National Forest continue to monitor water quality, gather information, and minimize impacts of firefighting efforts to the watershed.  Bull Run Watershed is an immense ‘value at risk’ in the Camp Creek Fire; fire managers used retardant during initial attack to keep the fire as small as possible to reduce the likelihood of impacts to water quality from wildfire.

The Bull Run water treatment facility has been well protected through fire management mitigation by the Portland Fire Department and Division P crews. Fire personnel working in Division P (on the south side of the fire) will be spiking out near U.S. HWY 26. “Spiking out” is a term referred to camping in a remote area rather than returning to the main incident base camp each evening. This is a common practice when there are long drive times and is an example of a mitigation to provide for crew safety. The crews working in this area will focus on placing hoses and water along the south edge of the fire in order to to give them a water source to use on the fire.

Today, information officers will be staged at the Jonsrud Lookout from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. and Safeway from 1:00 to 6:00 p.m. in Sandy, OR, to share updates and answer questions.

Smoke Outlook for August 30 and 31: https://outlooks.airfire.org/outlook/2c7a8f9b 

Closures and Evacuations:
Currently there are no fire related closures or evacuations. To be prepared in the case of any emergency, Clackamas County residents can receive critical emergency messaging via email, phone call, or text by signing up at https://www.clackamas.us/dm/publicalerts. Additional information on evacuation levels and planning can be found at https://www.clackamas.us/wildfires