Watch Latest On Riverside Fire: Now One-Third Contained After Three Inches Of Rain During Past Week

Clackamas County, Ore. – After three inches of rain in the last week. the Riverside fire in Clackamas county is now over one-third contained. Crews are working along Highway 224, putting out fires and hot spots in areas where heat was trapped under large trees that fell down. They are still working to clear long sections of Highway 224, which is the main access road to the Timberlake Job Corps Center and the Ripplebrook Ranger Station. The Riverside Fire has burned over 138,000 acres.

Read more from fire officials:

Weather and Fire Behavior: In the past week, more than three inches of rain have fallen over the fire area.  Sunny, clear, dry and breezy conditions are expected through today and into Monday with the potential for 30 mile per hour gusts along east-west orientated drainages.  No spread is expected. It will take a few days of warmer and dry weather before fine fuels such as grass are able to carry fire. East winds may bring more smoke to the area and isolated smokes from vegetation burning within the fire perimeter may be visible.

Yesterday: Firefighters patrolled the fire perimeter watching for places near the fireline where heat has held-over through the rains.  Crews on the south end of the fire worked to connect segments of dozer line with handline.

Today’s Activities: Along with handline, containment lines can include a combination of roads, scars from past fires, treated vegetation areas and natural features such as water or expanses of rock that are free of vegetation. Heavy equipment operators are working along roads with chippers and masticators to improve existing containment and contingency firelines.  Work along the 224 road continues.  This road is the main access to the Timberlake Job Corps and Ripplebrook Guard Station.  Patrol efforts are ongoing to seek and extinguish areas where heat has held in larger downed trees, stumps or root systems. In addition to monitoring and patrol efforts, firefighters are identifying and felling trees that were weakened by the fire and pose hazards along roads and around structures.

Evacuations: Current evacuation information is available at www.clackamas.us/wildfires, twitter.com/ClackCoSheriff or by calling 503-655-8224.

Smoke info: Oregon Smoke Blog: oregonsmoke.blogspot.com

Willamette Valley Smoke outlook: wildlandfiresmoke.net/outlooks/nworegon

Closures: 

Mt. Hood National Forest www.fs.usda.gov/news/mthood/news-events

Bureau of Land Management www.blm.gov/sites/blm.gov/files/orwa-fpo-nwo-092220.pdf

ADDITIONAL FIRE INFORMATION:

Fire Information: 509-228-7805

Road Closures on TripCheck: www.tripcheck.com/

 Inciweb:  inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/7174/

Facebook: www.facebook.com/RiversideFireInfo

Twitter: twitter.com/fire_riverside

Youtube: tinyurl.com/RiversideFireInfoVideos