For weeks, Sally and Dan Mack had been watching the Hagen Fire in Northwest Oregon creep toward their property on Oregon Route 204.
They had already taken steps to evacuate, packing their irreplaceable belongings, like pictures and scrapbooks, and relocating their camper, tractor and other vehicles. At night, the Macks and their 3-year-old maltipoo, Daisy, have been sleeping in their camper in Milton-Freewater and going home during the day.
Then, late last week, evacuation level 2 — “Be Ready” — became level 3: “Go Now!”
They did. The next day, nearby relatives also had to evacuate.
On Monday, Aug. 10, the Macks attended a community meeting at Walla Walla Community College on the Hagen, Paradise and Horse Ridge fires.
The event was hosted by the Northern Rockies Complex Incident Management Team 6, which is now overseeing the firefighting efforts.
The Hagen Fire is burning in Umatilla and Union counties, southwest of Tollgate. As of Monday, it had grown to almost 50,000 acres and is 11% contained, according to InciWeb.
The Paradise Fire, meanwhile, is burning in four counties — Washington’s Walla Walla and Columbia counties, and Oregon’s Wallowa and Umatilla counties — in the Mill Creek Watershed. It has burned at least 3,000 acres and is still active.
The Horse Ridge Fire, in Umatilla County, has burned more than 800 acres and is 98% contained.
The three wildfires ignited during lightning strikes on July 16.
Although authorities have closed some roads, no homes or other buildings have been lost, no deaths or injuries reported, according to Amy Hyfield, Team 6 public information officer.
However, an earlier blaze that firefighters contained more quickly, the Lower Dry Creek Fire in Umatilla County, burned several homes.
Carter MacKay, an incident meteorologist with the National Weather Service working with Team 6, told meeting attendees that the warm, dry pattern across the region is likely to continue.
Over the next few days, temperatures are expected to cool, and relative humidity is expected to increase. Starting Thursday, a plume of monsoon moisture will move toward Oregon and Washington, MacKay said. Thursday and Friday have a 5% to 10% chance of thunderstorms; over the weekend, the chances are 25%, he said.
The material that fuels fires, especially grasses, won’t be as combustible if a firebrand — a flaming piece of wood that flies off a fire and can spark additional fires — hits it, Hyfield said in an interview.
“That’s going to help us out a little bit, especially with the fire behavior,” she said, “but we are still going to see active fires, especially in the afternoon.”
Hyfield called the 2026 fire season “fairly unprecedented” in the Pacific Northwest.
About 3 million acres are either burning or have burned in Washington and Oregon alone, according to Team 6 Incident Commander Rich Cowger.
A dry winter made fire fuels especially fire-prone.
Sally Mack noted that she and Dan received less snow than at any time in the decade or so they’ve lived in their house.
“We usually get 7 to 12 feet of snow every year, and last year, the most we ever got was 4 to 5 feet,” she said.
Dan Mack, the Walla Walla County public works director, made himself available after the meeting in case community members had questions.
He and Sally are among the few who live in their area year-round. Many of the dwellings evacuated there are second homes; the Macks had to evacuate their primary home.
On their property and others, the firefighters put aboveground sprinklers and a water holding tank as extra protection; they call it “plumbing the house.”
Sally said she worries about her home, a stick-built structure that resembles a log cabin.
Even after the evacuation, the Macks have returned to check on things and further fire-proof their property by, for example, installing additional sprinklers.
“I wanted to get everything around our house soaked … I can’t just walk away,” Sally Mack said. “Our whole life’s in there.”
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