8/6/2014 9:00 am Castle Fire and Bridge 99 Complex Update

Attached and below is the update for the Castle Fire and Bridge 99 Complex Update for Wednesday, August 6, 2014 at 09:00:

Sisters OR – Crews continue to make progress on the Castle Fire.  The fire is mostly smoldering with no active flame.  Two crews made great progress mopping up yesterday.  A few isolated smoldering logs were found among rock slopes.  Today, two crews will continue to mop-up and begin patrolling the fire.  Helicopters will continue to assist firefighters in their work, as needed.

Yesterday, air resources discovered a few smokes on the Bear Butte 2 Fire.   Accelerated winds are predicted to occur in the fire area today.  Bear Butte 2 will continue to be monitored by air looking for signs of heat or smoke.  Areas of heat are still present in the interior of the Bridge 99 Fire with the highest intensity in the northern portion of the fire.  Today firefighters will patrol and mop-up along the fire perimeter.   The Bridge 99 fire will continue to be supported by engines and personnel.

The weather for the Sisters area will continue to be dry into Thursday with possible thunderstorms heading into Friday.  Winds will increase with gusts at or above 20mph on the ridgetops.

Today management of the fire is transitioning from the Oregon Type 2 Interagency Incident Management Team (IMT) and will transfer command to the Gila Las Cruces Type 3 IMT.

There are no changes to the evacuation or closure orders for the Castle Fire or for the Bridge 99 Complex.

There are no evacuation orders in place.

An area closure order from the Deschutes National Forest is in effect for the fire area, refer to the map that can be found in the maps section of http://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/4047/

The Monty Campground is closed to the public.

Forest Road 11 and 1170, and a segment of County Road 64 from Perry South to Monty Campground are closed.

The Castle Fire is located south of the Metolius River on the Sisters Ranger District of the Deschutes National Forest.  This lightning-caused fire started on August 1, 2014 and is burning on steep, rocky ground directly above the Metolius River.

For additional information on this fire, including maps, closure orders, photos, current status, and notices, please visit: http://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/4047/.