West Ashland: Controlled Burn Above Ashland Mine Road
The Ashland Forest Resiliency is having a controlled burn this morning that Lomakatsi Restoration Project and Grayback Forestry, Inc. will manage under safe and desired conditions. It has been too wet over most of the area up until now. Crews will be closely watching conditions to ensure firefighter and community safety because this is our top priority. The controlled burn is located above Ashland Mine Road, west of Ashland and will not directly impact roads or trails. Smoke is Very Likely to Impact the Community:
Smoke can drift into the watershed and cause issues for trail users, and you will see smoke during the day throughout the Rogue Valley.
In the evening hours, smoke will very likely impact neighborhoods from Strawberry Lane all the way to neighborhoods down to Valley View Road and along Hwy 99 including Westwood, upper Wimer and Ashland Mine Road for a brief time. As cooler air drops into the valley, the smoke can be pulled to lower elevations, so please take precautions.
Recommended Actions: Stay inside, close windows, turn on HEPA or other air filters, and wear a N95 respirator when smoke is present. See www.smokewiseashland.org for additional health recommendations.
Drone Monitoring:Crews who manage smoke and fire conditions are monitoring from the ground level to above the controlled burn using a drone. In the photo below, you can see recent drone monitoring that happened as the prescribed fire progressed on May 17th.
More Information
For burn day text notifications, text the word "WATERSHED" in the message line to 888777 as the recipient. You will get an auto-confirmation text when you sign-up. You can also download the Everbridge/Nixle app to get alerts.
Our primary objective when using prescribed fire is the safety and well-being of the community and fire crews. Please see this video to learn more about AFR.