Management
Wildland fires are a force of nature that can be nearly as impossible to prevent, and as difficult to control as hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods.
Fire can be a friend and a foe. In the right place at the right time, fire can create many environmental benefits, such as reducing grass, brush, and trees that can fuel large and severe wildfires and improving wildlife habitat. In the wrong place at the wrong time, fires can wreak havoc- threatening lives, homes, communities, and natural and cultural resources.
The Forest Service doesn’t – and can’t – manage wildfires alone. Instead, the agency works closely with other federal, tribal, state, and local partners. Longer fire seasons, bigger fires and more acres burned on average each year, more extreme fire behavior, and wildfire suppression operations in the wildland urban interface (WUI) have become the norm.
Wildfire Risk Reduction
Mt. Hood National Forest works with partners to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires in nearby communities. Learn more about this work and our strategic action plan that will cooperatively guide wildfire land management in the Mt. Hood region over the coming years.
Prescribed Fire
Fire is an important ecological process. Fire managers use prescribed fire to mimic the natural role of fire on the landscape. Prescribed fire can be used to maintain and restore the condition and function of ecosystems and to reduce wildfire risk.
Prescribed fire generally includes underburning and pile burning. Underburning, also known as broadcast burning, is the controlled application of fire to small shrubs, grasses, and other fuels on the ground. The burns are carefully planned and only conducted under specific conditions to meet forest health objectives. Certain criteria has to be met in order for a broadcast burn to take place, including smoke dispersal conditions, weather, adequate staffing, and fuel moisture. These are all outlined in a burn plan, that is thoroughly reviewed before implementation.
Fire personnel follow policies outlined in the Oregon Department of Forestry smoke management plan to help minimize smoke impacts to visibility and public health.
On Mt. Hood National Forest, most underburning occurs on the eastern side of the mountain in the spring and/or fall. Pile burning occurs across the Forest during the fall and winter months.
Fire Recovery
Oregon experienced hot and very dry conditions in 2020. A historic windstorm during Labor Day weekend resulted in wildfires burning more than a 100,000 acres on the Mt. Hood National Forest. Many fire-impacted areas will take years to recover, but we are working to restore safe access for forest users.
The 2020 Riverside Fire impacted more than a hundred thousand acres on Clackamas River Ranger District and burned many campgrounds, day use areas, trails, administrative buildings, and more. It will continue to take many years for the Forest to recover.
- In the Clackamas & Collawash River corridors, all sites beyond Alder Flat will be open in Summer 2025. Check out individual recreation sites for 2025 status.
- Recreation staff continue to work on repairing remaining closed campgrounds.
- Dispersed camping east/south of the Highway 224/Forest Road 46 junction is allowed.
- Per Forest Order, Forest Road 54 (Fish Creek Road) remains closed to motor vehicles until danger trees are removed. This contract is underway & should be completed this calendar year.
- Many areas of high fire intensity are full of hazard trees and hillsides that may give way and cause landslides. Read more about hazard & danger tree work on the Forest.
- Inventory of fire-related damage to recreation sites from the Riverside Fire.
- Be careful when in burned areas.
The Lionshead Fire impacted ~17,000 acres of the south part of the Clackamas River Ranger District.
- Recreation crews completed substantial trail work within the Bull of the Woods Wilderness and surrounding the Olallie Lake Scenic Area in 2024 with remaining Congressional fire recovery funding.
- In the Olallie Lakes Scenic Area, Peninsula, Paul Dennis, Camp 10, Olallie Meadow, and Triangle Campgrounds will be open for Summer 2025. Olallie Lake Resort is also operating during its normal summer season.
- The area around and south of Olallie has dead and weakened hazard trees. Be careful in burned areas. View photos of the Olallie Lake area after the Lionshead Fire.