Spokane Wildfires Force 65,000 From Homes
Three wildfires burning around Spokane remain zero percent contained, roughly 700 buildings have burned, and Governor Bob Ferguson has asked Washington for an emergency declaration.
A wildfire in Spokane, the second largest city in the U.S. state of Washington, had driven roughly 65,000 people from their homes by Monday and destroyed about 700 buildings, with none of the three fire zones burning since Saturday brought under even one percent containment. For Serbia and the region, where summer is measured in hectares of scorched brush and the evacuation of a single village already counts as the day’s news, Spokane shows what happens when fire reaches a city of more than 230,000 people and local resources stop being enough.
The fire broke out on Saturday, August 1, and evacuations began the same day. By Monday morning the three fires had together burned through 2,800 hectares, or about 31 square kilometers, filling the sky over the city with smoke and haze.
Three fire zones, zero percent contained
The Washington State Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is tracking them under three names:
- Old Trails, the largest, northwest of Spokane, with more than 1,460 hectares burned
- Fairview, which pushed to the edge of the city
- Autumn Lane, the third and newest
None of the three is contained, the containment level stands at zero percent for all of them. The cause of none of the fires has been determined yet, and strong wind, high temperatures and drought are driving them. Monday’s forecast called for lower temperatures and weaker wind, but no rain.
What does a level three evacuation mean?
It is the highest warning level in the American public alert system, and it means residents leave immediately, without packing and without waiting for further instructions. The designation was placed over a large part of the area around Spokane, including the town of Airway Heights, and Mayor Lisa Brown said nearly half of the city’s neighborhoods were either already evacuated or under direct threat from the fire.
“A very large area has been placed under level three, which means get out now,” Brown said.
Patients were also evacuated from the Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in the city. By Monday, no deaths or serious injuries had been confirmed, an outcome that is unusual alongside 700 destroyed buildings.
The biggest unknown of the first weekend was the number of people being searched for. Cpl. Mark Gregory, spokesman for the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office, said on Monday how many reports had been resolved:
We initially had about 290 missing person reports, and at this point we have cleared all but 14.
Gregory added that not all the reports are necessarily connected to the fires near Spokane, since people in the county are also reported missing for other reasons.
Why Ferguson is pushing for a federal declaration
Governor Bob Ferguson declared a statewide state of emergency on Saturday and banned outdoor burning until September 30. On Monday he said he had spoken with President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, and that he had requested a federal emergency declaration, which would open access to funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
That request is not a formality. Ferguson is a Democrat, and the question of who gets federal help and under what conditions has become a political issue during this White House term, and the governor himself acknowledged he is aware that some states have run into obstacles securing FEMA funds. The response from Washington, this time the capital and not the state of the same name, will be an early, measurable sign of how the administration handles requests from states that are not part of its electoral base.
How much has actually burned
Spokane is not an isolated case. Seventeen fires are burning across Washington state, and the total area affected exceeds 390 square miles, or roughly 1,010 square kilometers. That is close to a third of Belgrade’s administrative territory, burned within a matter of days.
That is why Washington Senator Maria Cantwell’s assessment is more cautious than the weather forecast. “We’re not out of the woods. The next two days will be tough,” the senator said.
The outdoor burning ban in Washington state runs until September 30, the end of fire season in the Pacific Northwest. Governor Ferguson’s request for a federal emergency declaration has been on the White House’s desk since Monday, and the answer will determine whether rebuilding the burned neighborhoods of Spokane is funded from the state treasury or from federal funds.
