Updated 1615 Hours PDT
Incident Summary
A Level 3 evacuation was issued by the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office around 1500 Hours PDT today, for residents living in the area of Old Vantage Highway and Frenchman Coulee in Vantage Washington. A Level 3 means, “Leave now. Danger to Life and Property is Imminent.”
Mutual Aid Responding
A county-wide page went out for all available fire agencies and wildland fire equipment to respond to the Staging area located at the Silica Ridge Farms, located at 1454 Silica Road, off of I-90.
Nearby Event
There is a large event happening at the Gorge and smoke can be seen but the fire is blowing South of the venue and is not endangering any lives or properties. Due to the high wind, the venue does have their high wind protocols activated, including cancelling some individual shows. The Sasquatch Festival is still ongoing and no evacuations have occurred.
Weather Conditions
The weather has been deemed to be pushing the fire at a higher than expected forward rate prompting some evacuations. It is now becoming a wind-driven fire.
Current conditions consist of 18 mph with gusts up to 25 mph.
Other Fires Burning in the State
At the time of this post, there are two (2) other wildfires burning in Washington State. One fire is near Airway Heights (Spokane County) and the other is in Wenatchee (Chelan County).
Hashtags Used by Social Media
Vantage Fire – #Sunland (We’re using #SunlandFire and #WaWildfires2016)
Wenatchee – #WenatcheeFire
Spokane County – #AirwayHeightsFire
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