Northwest Red Flag Warning. 'Prepare To Evacuate Now!'

A “red flag warning” has been issued for northeast Oregon and southeast Washington Wednesday, meaning new wildfires are likely to spark and spread quickly in the region where firefighters are battling and dry lightening is expected in apporximately 48 hours. Some residents who have not evacuated are being told to prepare to do so now as the worst drought California has ever experienced spreads north.

In Oregon alone, firefighters are battling a dozen wildfires across 90,000 acres, according to the National Wildfire Coordinating Group.

Approximately 300 structures are threatened now and numerous public lands are closed. A major power transmission line to Idaho lies in the path of one of the fires.

This West Coast fire season, from mid-May to mid-October, the blazes are exacerbated by extreme drought in California and abnormally dry conditions across Oregon, Washington and Idaho, according to experts.

The drought crisis has moved north. California’s crippling drought conditions “have never been worse,” NBC reported Wednesday..

Oregon could see dry lightning by Friday, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Dan Byrd, who is monitoring a 10,500-acre complex of fires on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation dubbed the Logging Unit blazes.

The Rowena fire, that erupted Tuesday in the Columbia River Gorge in northern Oregon, was threatening 70 homes by mid-morning. It prompted the evacuation of seven homes. Near the Idaho border, a 4,000-acre fire threatened homes of 160 people in Imnaha and residents near the 36,000-acre South Fork Complex fire were told to prepare for possible evacuations.

The drought report, released Thursday by the National Drought Mitigation Center, warned that bone-dry conditions have now spread farther into Northern California. The state is “short more than one year’s worth of reservoir water, or 11.6 million acre-feet, for this time of year,” the report said.

The drought began three years ago and also has “nearly depleted” the state’s topsoil moisture reserves.

Meanwhile, residents caught hosing sidewalks or driveways or excessively watering their lawns can now be slapped with a $500 fine.