Three more C. Oregon prescribed burns planned

After monitoring rainfall amounts over the past few days, fuels specialists on the Bend-Fort Rock Ranger District will use prescribed fire starting Friday to burn up to 428 acres on Wickiup Butte, 18 miles west of La Pine, near the Wickiup Reservoir Dam.

Operations are expected to take two to four days and may create smoke impacts to the Haner Park, Ponderosa Estates and Wild River subdivisions, as well as along Burgess Road (FS Road 43) and FS Roads 44 and 4260.

Additionally, as conditions allow, fuels specialists with the Crescent Ranger District will use prescribed fire to burn about 81 acres near the Two Rivers North and Cascade Estates subdivisions and Highway 58, seven miles southwest of Crescent.

Smoke could impact the subdivisions as well as Highway 58 in the vicinity of milepost 80 and FS Road 5825.

Project objectives for both areas include reintroducing fire into fire-adapted ecosystems and reducing hazardous fuel loading adjacent to valued areas.

Plans to burn about 80 acres within the Lava Cast Forest, seven miles east of Sunriver early next week are still contingent on weather conditions over the weekend. To ensure safe and successful implementation of this prescribed fire, FS Road 9720 will be closed between the FS Road 800 and FS Road 9710 junctions during operations.

Due to the size and location of these fires the public could see plumes of smoke. If smoke drifts onto roads, motorists should slow down, turn on headlights, and proceed with care.

For more information, please visit the “Prescribed Fires” link on the Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center website, http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/centraloregon/fire/

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