The state Office of Emergency Management said Friday it had increased staffing and set up an Emergency Operations Center to bring agencies together to coordinate a response to the fires.
A band of extremely dry air moving across Oklahoma from west to east is a major contributor to the fire weather. While at the Emergency Operations Center, State Forester Mark Goeller said the fires are spurring along the line and continue to grow.
“And as this thing marches east, we can expect that any starts that we've seen similar to this will similarly start to erupt as it moves further to the east,” Goeller said.
As the evening approaches, humid air will bring some relief. Higher relative humidity values have reached the Panhandle and are expected to move east. The National Service projects wind speeds will also die down.
“So we do have a ray of hope out there, but it's going to be several hours before we get into that where we can start seeing some relief,” Goeller said. “That's when the fire departments and the resources that we have will start to be able to, at least, start making some headway to catch a lot of the fires that we've got going on.”
Meteorologists estimated dozens of fires started and spread in Western, Central and Northeast Oklahoma.
More than 88,900 people lost power across the state Friday afternoon, with around 3,000 outages in Rogers Mills County.
There were more than a dozen evacuation orders around Oklahoma.
At 5:30 pm, officials notified the NWS that the Chickasha fire was under control and evacuation orders were canceled. The NWS had urged Chickasha residents to prepare for possible evacuation after a fire started up about an hour earlier. The City of Chickasha requested voluntary evacuation for people near 25th Street and Country Club Road.
At 4:05 p.m. the National Weather Service reported multiple wildfires in eastern and southern parts of Logan County and officials have issued evacuation notices.
After a fire popped up near Lake Carl Blackwell around 3:00 p.m. The National Weather Service warned Stillwater residents to be prepared to evacuate.
Fires are burning near Arcadia and Meridian in northeast Oklahoma County and moving northeast towards Cushing. Another fire is burning in Payne County near Yale.
As of 4:55 pm, several fires are burning from the east side of Moore to Lake Thunderbird and moving northeast at three to five miles per hour. Officials ordered evacuations four miles north and four miles east of 108th Avenue and Tecumseh Road in Norman just after 2 pm, according to the National Weather Service.
Norman emergency officials ordered an evacuation of some residents directly south of Lake Thunderbird just before 2 p.m. The National Weather Service said there were as many as four dangerous wildfires in the area.
https://x.com/NWSNorman/status/1900619421179408748
Another fire arose around 11:30 a.m. in Roger Mills County, triggering a mandatory evacuation order for Leedey in Dewey County as the fire moved toward town. At 3:10 p.m. the National Weather Service reported another wildfire west of Camargo in Dewey County moving east and northeast.
Another fire started southwest of El Reno around 1 p.m.
Even people not affected by fires are feeling the effects of this weather. As the dryline swept a line of dust across the state, Oklahomans found themselves slammed by gusts around 70 miles per hour.
The National Weather Service in Norman issued a Blowing Dust Advisory for the western part of the state. That advisory lasts through 9 p.m. Friday.
The Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality issued a health advisory about particulate matter in the air. As of 5 p.m., the entire state had higher levels of particulate matter — things like smoke and dust — in the air than the DEQ classifies as healthy. Nearly 20 counties in southwest Oklahoma had unhealthy levels, as did Tulsa and Kay Counties. Thirty more counties had levels unhealthy for sensitive populations, and the rest had levels rated “moderate.”
The National Weather Service in Norman posted that it had received multiple reports of accidents caused by the wind Friday and advised caution on the roads.
On Thursday, the Oklahoma Forestry Services issued a Red Flag Warning for all 77 counties. The department wrote conditions for fire strength are expected to relax Saturday and Sunday, but increase Monday and Tuesday.
Another fire in Kiowa County has burned down the 104-year-old Rainy Mountain Kiowa Indian Baptist Church. The historical church is located between the towns of Gotebo and Mountain View and serves as a place of worship and burial site for Kiowa, Comanche and Apache members. It’s unknown at this time when the fire started.
