Air Quality & Wildfire News — August 9, 2026

A heavy weekend across the West and western Canada: mass evacuations in British Columbia, a fire in Oregon approaching a state record, smoke advisories stretching from Washington to Colorado, and confirmation of two deaths at a Utah fire.

More than 20,000 evacuated along British Columbia's Okanagan Lake

A fast-moving wildfire forced over 20,000 people to leave communities along Okanagan Lake in British Columbia over the weekend, destroying homes and prompting aircraft rescues for dozens of people, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. South of the border, crews in Washington kept working near containment lines on three fires that started in the Spokane area more than a week ago.

The blaze, near Summerland and Peachland, is the Bald Range wildfire, and the province declared a state of emergency on August 8 after it expanded in hot, dry, windy conditions, Newsweek reports. The BC Wildfire Service publishes a live map of active incidents, evacuation alerts and fire perimeters.

Air quality alerts across six western states

Smoke does not stop at the border, and the National Weather Service has advisories out for parts of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and Colorado, with some areas seeing unhealthy or very unhealthy levels of fine particle pollution, according to Newsweek. Cities named in the alerts include Denver, Fort Collins and Greeley in Colorado; Spokane, Yakima, Kennewick and Walla Walla in Washington; Boise, Coeur d'Alene and Lewiston in Idaho; and Missoula and Great Falls in Montana.

Canadian smoke has drifted into the Midwest, Great Lakes, Northeast and Mid-Atlantic repeatedly this summer. On days like this it is worth checking your local number before you plan anything outdoors, since conditions can shift within a few hours as the wind changes.

Oregon's Big Grass fire nears a state record

The Big Grass fire grew by more than 70,000 acres to 513,437 acres, closing in on Oregon's all-time record of 557,028 acres set by the 2012 Long Draw Fire, the Oregonian reports. Like Long Draw, it spans a state line, with at least half of it stretching into Idaho. More than a thousand firefighters are assigned, and it was 39% contained Sunday morning.

Thirty other fires were burning in Oregon, several of them over 100,000 acres: the Coleman Creek, Second Flat, Hay Creek and Rowe Creek incidents. Crews made large gains on all of those in the past week, and each sat between 79% and 97% containment Sunday. Closer to Portland, the 54,000-acre Grasshopper fire in Mount Hood National Forest was still threatening structures and prompting evacuations at 23% containment.

Two pilots confirmed dead in the Utah helicopter crash

Officials confirmed Saturday that the two people aboard the Sikorsky Skycrane that went down Friday morning while fighting a fire in Fishlake National Forest were killed, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. The crash started a new fire that merged with the existing blaze, which has now burned nearly 174 square miles. The pilots were employed by Helicopter Transport Services under contract to the US Forest Service. The NTSB will investigate once its team can reach the wreckage, which will likely take a year or more.

Sevier County Sheriff Nathan Curtis described the recovery as difficult, with the crash site above 7,000 feet in steep terrain thick with brush and trees, the Deseret News reports. Within 30 to 40 minutes of crews starting in on foot, a column of fire moved toward them and responders had to be pulled back. "If we had not moved some of our responders and hand crews out, they would have been trapped by the fire as well," Curtis said. A state Department of Public Safety helicopter later flew detectives and a medical examiner close to the site to recover the two victims, whose names have not been released.

Oregon also mourned a death this week: 47-year-old Jason Ensign was killed while operating a bulldozer for a timber company at the Wrights Spring fire, which grew rapidly Thursday and cut off his escape route.

Evacuations in Morgan County, Utah

Residents from Whites Crossing to East Canyon Dam in Morgan County were asked to evacuate Sunday because of the Rocky Canyon Fire, the Deseret News reports. A shelter was opened at Morgan High School's Trojan Century Center. The fire started Friday and was mapped at 2,800 acres with 0% containment by Sunday, with the cause still under investigation.

East Canyon State Park ordered visitors out of its north end, including the Dixie Creek Campground and day-use areas, and portions of state routes 66 and 65 were closed. Crews spent Saturday working the perimeter with dozers, roads, line construction and aircraft.

Sources

Wildfires burn across western US and Canada as residents are evacuated — The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Map Shows Where Millions of Americans At Risk as Canadian Wildfires Explode — Newsweek
Border-spanning Oregon wildfire inches closer to setting historic record — The Oregonian
Pilots of helicopter that crashed while fighting wildfire in Utah are dead, officials say — The Philadelphia Inquirer
Treacherous conditions complicated recovery efforts of firefighters killed in Utah helicopter crash — Salt Lake City Deseret News
Evacuations ordered due to Morgan County's Rocky Canyon Fire — Salt Lake City Deseret News

Canairy aggregates publicly reported air-quality and wildfire news and summarizes it in plain English, with links to the original sources. This is educational information, not medical or emergency advice. In a wildfire or air-quality emergency, follow guidance from local authorities.