BOISE, Idaho – Powerful winds and hundreds of lightning strikes from thunderstorms rattled eastern Oregon and Idaho Wednesday afternoon, cutting power and stoking fires, including one in Oregon that is already the largest active blaze in the nation.
The Durkee Fire, burning near the Oregon-Idaho border about 130 miles (209 kilometers) west of Boise, Idaho, caused the closure of a stretch of Interstate 84 again Wednesday. Amid rapidly forming storms in the afternoon, the blaze crossed the interstate near the town of Huntington, home to about 500 people. It also merged with the Cow Valley Fire, another large blaze that had been burning nearby, Gov. Tina Kotek said.
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"The wildfires in Eastern Oregon have scaled up quickly,” Kotek said in a news release Wednesday evening, calling it a dynamic situation. “We are facing strong erratic winds over the region that could impact all fires. Rain is not getting through. Some communities do not have power."
She said she had deployed the National Guard to the region.
The nearly 420-square-mile (1,088-square-kilometer) blaze had prompted the evacuation of Huntington on Sunday, and on Wednesday city officials posted on Facebook that people remaining in town, especially those with “major health issues,” needed to leave their homes because of wildfire smoke and the lack of power. City officials also said Wednesday that gas service to residents had been shut off until the evacuation orders are lifted.
The fire approached Alison Oszman’s home in Rye Valley, a small ranching area north of Huntington, last week, but they were able to protect their property with the help of Bureau of Land Management firefighters and neighbors, using small tanker trucks and shovels. They used a small dozer to keep it away from the house, she said.
Since their property was burned and safe, her neighbor moved his horses and cattle over as the fire moved toward his ranch, she said. On Wednesday night, Oszman went to check his property and found that the fire came down a steep hillside and threatened his home.
“I went and parked our truck out in the field just in case those big trees by his house caught fire,” she said. “I was making sure sparks didn’t land in the dirt or the dry grass. But as the fire passed his house, it started raining.” The rain helped the firefighters get on top of the blaze.
“It was pretty scary but everything seemed to fall into place,” she said. “Everybody helped everybody. It was actually pretty amazing for how crummy it really was.”
The National Weather Service in Boise said the storms were capable of producing wind gusts up to 70 mph with blowing dust reducing visibility. A storm about 44 miles (71 kilometers) northwest of Huntington near Baker City on Wednesday afternoon had recorded a wind gust of 66 mph (106 kph), the weather service said.
Wind, lightning and heavy rain fell that could cause flash flooding and debris flows in recently burned areas, authorities said. Flash flood warnings were issued for Huntington and in a nearby burn scar area.
A flash flood warning was issued for the Cow Valley burn scar in Eastern Oregon at about 8 p.m. Wednesday and was expected to last until 10:30 p.m., said Les Colin, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Boise, Idaho. A strong thunderstorm moved into a burned area that is especially susceptible to flooding, he said. No homes are in the area but Interstate 84 runs close by.
The Oregon State Fire Marshal's office also mobilized nearly 500 firefighters to help protect communities that could be threatened by wildfires on Wednesday.
The major electricity utility in the region, Idaho Power, warned customers to prepare for possible outages, and by late Wednesday afternoon, nearly 7,000 customers were without electricity, the utility said. The utility also cut power to customers in the Boise foothills and other nearby areas, citing extreme weather and wildfire risk.
More than 60 significant fires are burning in Oregon and Washington alone, and Oregon has been plagued with hundreds of lightning strikes from thunderstorms in recent days that have started new blazes in bone-dry vegetation.
A fire in southern California also was moving fast and threatening homes.
Evacuation orders were in effect Wednesday night in San Diego County after a wildfire began to spread fast near the San Diego and Riverside county line. Fire officials say the Grove Fire is spreading southeast through steep and challenging terrain. The fire grew to 1.3 square mile (3.4 square kilometers) within a few hours but was 5% contained just before 8 p.m., Cal Fire said on the social media platform X.
The smoke from the Durkee Fire in Oregon was choking the air in Boise and beyond. An air quality warning was in effect for the entire region on Wednesday.
Patrick Nauman, the owner of Weiser Classic Candy in the small town of Weiser, Idaho, near the Oregon border, said driving into town Wednesday morning was “like driving into a fog bank, because it’s so thick and low to the road.”
Nauman’s shop is on the main intersection in town and is typically a popular spot to stop for lunch or a sugar fix, but customer traffic has dropped by half in the past few days as thick smoke and triple-digit temperatures dogged the region.
“Yesterday you could smell it, taste it, it just kind of hung in the back of your throat,” Nauman said of the smoke.
Mike Cantin, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Boise, said cooler air moving into the region Wednesday evening could stoke the Durkee and other fires. A red flag warning was in effect, and the area has been suffering through a heat wave, including many days over 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius).
“With these winds showing up today, every little spark could get out of hand very easily. It could be a really hazardous situation very fast,” Cantin said. “Don’t light anything on fire, and be very careful around grass.”
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Associated Press writer Lisa Baumann contributed from Bellingham, Washington and Martha Bellisle contributed from Seattle.