A Little Off My Game Due to Fires

[WazzuCoug]

We aren't under evacuation orders, yet, but many people surrounding us have been. The picture below was the scene at my house (northwest Oregon) mid-day. It's a little bit brighter now. The air quality and getting prepared to evacuate have certainly knocked me off my game. Eating is fine, physical activity is down, for sure. I'm not exercising indoors either because even though we have a great air filtration system, the air quality is still not great inside either. Nothing like the outside, of course.

I forgot to close the side in windows in my truck and now it has piles of ash all over the inside...sigh.

So, week 8 is an interesting one.....how many times am I going to say how weird 2020 has been? Now I'm expecting our volcano to blow, and the big west coast earthquake to happen before the end of the year.

Ryan

 

[LisaLisa]

wow! that sure looks scary! Exercise can wait until you can see blue sky! Stay safe!

 

[Kayleigh]

That looks really scary. How close is the fire from your house?

 

[3momchaos]

My best friend is currently under evacuation orders in Central Point. I’m sorry you can’t get outside, I know from her how horrible this has been

 

[Dearsweet]

Stay safe - there will be plenty of time to exercise. Just be good with your food and water intake.

 

[Brenda2010]

So scary! I hope you don't get evacuation orders. I'll be keeping you in my thoughts.

 

[WazzuCoug]

That looks really scary. How close is the fire from your house?

At the moment there are several fires. Probably 5 miles-ish is the closest, but there is quite a wall of fires to our east and southeast. But smaller fires keep popping up here and there, so you never really know. The winds have been favorable for us, but that could certainly change. It’s as brown and dry as I’ve ever seen in this part of Oregon.

 

[WazzuCoug]

My best friend is currently under evacuation orders in Central Point. I’m sorry you can’t get outside, I know from her how horrible this has been

Whole towns have pretty much been wiped away. It is very bad. We have a nice large dirt field on one side of us, but trees, brush and pasture around the rest of our property. It’s a bit scary, for sure.

 

[missyinacage]

Oh, man. That is so scary. Stay safe out there.

 

[Bill S.]

Where I live in Orange County right now it looks like we’re living on Mars right now the skies are orange and grey

 

[WazzuCoug]

Most of the county around us are under evacuation orders. We've been moved up to be ready to evacuate (one level below "evacuate now." I suspect we'll have to leave shortly. We have our essentials and some special keepsakes ready to go. Sigh.

 

[Brenda2010]

My god guys, I can't even imagine how you feel right now. I'm so sorry.

 

[canecorso81]

Stay safe!!! Will be thinking of everyone being affected by the fires

 

[Matia]

Wishing you and your family strength during this challenging time. You are in our thoughts and prayers. Please keep us posted on how you are doing.

 

[WazzuCoug]

Hi all. It was looking pretty bad. We had our vehicles packed with all of our critical papers, keepsakes, and living essentials and were ready to evacuate. We were at a Level 2 (be prepared to leave at a moment's notice) and expected to go to Level 3 (Go!). The closes level 3 areas were not very far to our east and south. Our county has two of the largest fires in Oregon, and a few smaller ones.

We were going to head out before it got to Level 3, but the county made a request for Level 2 residents to stay put because the roads were getting jammed up and preventing residents of Level 3 areas to get out, so we stayed put.

Thankfully, the winds died down and started coming in from the ocean, which brought fog and humidity to the area. This has been consistent for three days and we've been downgraded to Level 1 ("Be ready"). A few areas of the county have been downgraded to "normal."

Tonight and tomorrow there is a reasonable chance of rain. That will help the lowlands, but the two major fires that are higher up will probably be burning until the real winter Oregon rains come.

The air quality is horrendous and exacerbated by the fog that rolled in, but the fog has certainly helped the firefighters. The last two days there was a nice layer of water/dew on everything, although it made the ash pretty pasty on our vehicles.

So, we are feeling pretty safe now. We are staying in a "ready" mode for a while, just in case a fire starts to our west, but that is starting to look like it shouldn't be an issue with the weather patterns that seem to come over the next couple of weeks.

Our daughter still hasn't started school. The fires torched some networking for the school, and although they were able to switch to alternative networks and servers, the fires and air quality has kept them from starting. They are supposed to start this Thursday (online video classes).

There is still a lot burning out there, and there are many, many people suffering. We have been lucky, so far.

So, there's the update.

 

[3momchaos]

Hi all. It was looking pretty bad. We had our vehicles packed with all of our critical papers, keepsakes, and living essentials and were ready to evacuate. We were at a Level 2 (be prepared to leave at a moment's notice) and expected to go to Level 3 (Go!). The closes level 3 areas were not very far to our east and south. Our county has two of the largest fires in Oregon, and a few smaller ones.

We were going to head out before it got to Level 3, but the county made a request for Level 2 residents to stay put because the roads were getting jammed up and preventing residents of Level 3 areas to get out, so we stayed put.

Thankfully, the winds died down and started coming in from the ocean, which brought fog and humidity to the area. This has been consistent for three days and we've been downgraded to Level 1 ("Be ready"). A few areas of the county have been downgraded to "normal."

Tonight and tomorrow there is a reasonable chance of rain. That will help the lowlands, but the two major fires that are higher up will probably be burning until the real winter Oregon rains come.

The air quality is horrendous and exacerbated by the fog that rolled in, but the fog has certainly helped the firefighters. The last two days there was a nice layer of water/dew on everything, although it made the ash pretty pasty on our vehicles.

So, we are feeling pretty safe now. We are staying in a "ready" mode for a while, just in case a fire starts to our west, but that is starting to look like it shouldn't be an issue with the weather patterns that seem to come over the next couple of weeks.

Our daughter still hasn't started school. The fires torched some networking for the school, and although they were able to switch to alternative networks and servers, the fires and air quality has kept them from starting. They are supposed to start this Thursday (online video classes).

There is still a lot burning out there, and there are many, many people suffering. We have been lucky, so far.

So, there's the update.

I’m glad you’re safe! My friend lives in Central Point, works at a hospital in Medford. She has horrible asthma already, so this is just the worst for her. I hope y’all get some rain sooner rather than later!

 

[Brenda2010]

Hi all. It was looking pretty bad. We had our vehicles packed with all of our critical papers, keepsakes, and living essentials and were ready to evacuate. We were at a Level 2 (be prepared to leave at a moment's notice) and expected to go to Level 3 (Go!). The closes level 3 areas were not very far to our east and south. Our county has two of the largest fires in Oregon, and a few smaller ones.

We were going to head out before it got to Level 3, but the county made a request for Level 2 residents to stay put because the roads were getting jammed up and preventing residents of Level 3 areas to get out, so we stayed put.

Thankfully, the winds died down and started coming in from the ocean, which brought fog and humidity to the area. This has been consistent for three days and we've been downgraded to Level 1 ("Be ready"). A few areas of the county have been downgraded to "normal."

Tonight and tomorrow there is a reasonable chance of rain. That will help the lowlands, but the two major fires that are higher up will probably be burning until the real winter Oregon rains come.

The air quality is horrendous and exacerbated by the fog that rolled in, but the fog has certainly helped the firefighters. The last two days there was a nice layer of water/dew on everything, although it made the ash pretty pasty on our vehicles.

So, we are feeling pretty safe now. We are staying in a "ready" mode for a while, just in case a fire starts to our west, but that is starting to look like it shouldn't be an issue with the weather patterns that seem to come over the next couple of weeks.

Our daughter still hasn't started school. The fires torched some networking for the school, and although they were able to switch to alternative networks and servers, the fires and air quality has kept them from starting. They are supposed to start this Thursday (online video classes).

There is still a lot burning out there, and there are many, many people suffering. We have been lucky, so far.

So, there's the update.

I'm really glad to hear that the weather is in your favor and that the risk has been downgraded. Sheesh, on top of everything else going on in the world... I feel for everyone out west. I can't even imagine.

 

[Brenda2010]

I’m glad you’re safe! My friend lives in Central Point, works at a hospital in Medford. She has horrible asthma already, so this is just the worst for her. I hope y’all get some rain sooner rather than later!

Sorry to hear about your friend! I hope she's getting special care since she works in the hospital.