“It is unsafe to stay and threatens the safety of you, your family and emergency workers. Your life may be in great danger,” the Josephine County Sheriff’s Office said Friday of people in the evacuation zone. “Emergency services personnel may not be available to assist you if you choose to stay.” Oregon Gov. Kate Brown said in a tweet Saturday that she was invoking the Fire Emergency Act to make additional state resources available “to slow the fire’s progress.” High winds in the valley and high temperatures helped the fire spread Friday afternoon, fire officials said. Sparks flew outside an established perimeter on both sides of a river, “which created fires that began to move rapidly uphill,” according to an InciWeb news release Saturday. collapsed, pushing the fire to the south and east,” the statement said. The fire’s intensity dropped overnight with cooler temperatures and higher humidity, helping firefighters “conduct a variety of tactical suppression operations” to protect the Rand and Galice, according to the release. The fire was started by lightning on August 17, fire officials said. The fire has resulted in at least one fatality: Logan Taylor, a 25-year-old wildland firefighter, died last week after being struck by a tree while battling the blaze. the officials said. The fire had not destroyed any homes as of Saturday morning, according to a wildfire information website operated by the state’s emergency management department. It is one of more than 30 active fires in the state. CNN’s Tina Burnside and Paradise Afshar contributed to this report.
