Nearly as Many Acres of Oregon Are Currently On Fire as Burned in All of 2016

That's more than 185,000 acres.

Fire response teams ("Northwest Incident Team #13") gathering at a Fire Camp in Joseph Stewart State Park near Medford, Oregon. (Josiah Q. Roe)

By Elise Herron

Roughly 185,457 acres of Oregon land are currently on fire, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. That represents 13 wildfires blazing throughout the state, mostly in Southern Oregon.

It's almost as much as the number of Oregon acres—219,509—that burned the entire year of 2016.

The NIFC also predicts the Pacific Northwest region in the coming months will be at "above normal" risk for wildfires. Hot, dry summers are making forest infernos increasingly common.

And all that smoke from Southern Oregon and Northern California? It's on its way up to Portland this week.

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