Oregon’s 2026 wildfire season has surpassed every previous year on record — both in acres burned and in the cost of suppression. According to a preliminary report released this week by the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF), the state’s net fire costs have reached an estimated $236.2 million as of late August 2026, with the fire season still ongoing.

Breaking the 2024 Record

The 2024 fire season was previously Oregon’s costliest on record. The 2026 figures have now surpassed 2024’s final net costs by approximately 29 percent, or roughly $35.3 million, even before current fires are fully contained and final accounting is complete. Oregon’s 2026 season has burned approximately 2.5 million acres — a 29 percent increase over 2024’s burning footprint, which itself set a state record at the time.

Officials are calling this a record-shattering season by virtually every meaningful metric.

What’s Driving the Costs

The record costs stem from several compounding factors:

  • Volume of incidents: Oregon saw 30 or more large, uncontained fires burning simultaneously at the season’s peak in late August, placing extraordinary demand on agency budgets for personnel, equipment, and aviation resources.
  • Aerial resources: The deployment of airtankers, helicopters, and air attack platforms at sustained high levels for weeks has been one of the largest cost drivers. Aviation costs in extreme fire years typically account for 30–40 percent of total suppression costs.
  • Extended duration: Several fires have burned for weeks, requiring sustained Type 1 and Type 2 incident management teams with large crew complements — each costing tens of thousands of dollars per day to operate.
  • Drought conditions: More than half of Oregon is under severe drought (Level 2 of 4) and roughly 20 percent faces extreme drought (Level 3 of 4), making fires harder to contain and requiring more resources per fire than in an average year.

Seeking Emergency Funds

The Oregon Department of Forestry is working with the Oregon Emergency Conference Board and state legislative leadership to secure emergency supplemental appropriations to cover costs beyond what was budgeted for the 2025–2027 biennium. The emergency board has authority to appropriate additional funds between legislative sessions. ODF officials have indicated that a formal request for additional state funding is being prepared and is expected to be submitted in the coming weeks.

Oregon also relies on federal reimbursement mechanisms for fires on federal land through agreements with the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. However, the majority of the state’s fire suppression costs pertain to fires on state and private lands where ODF holds protection responsibility and for which federal cost-sharing is more limited.

Federal Context

The record costs in Oregon mirror a national trend. Across the country, the 2026 fire season has already burned more than 8.3 million acres nationally, with suppression expenditures running well above historical averages. Even with the fire funding fix mechanism enacted in prior years that established a dedicated wildfire suppression account, the scale of 2026 fire activity is straining both federal and state systems.

Legislative Action Expected

Oregon’s Legislative Assembly is expected to take up wildfire funding in a special session this fall. Fire preparedness, community defensible space programs, and long-term forest health investments — including fuel reduction treatments and prescribed fire — are expected to be central topics of debate as lawmakers grapple with the escalating cost of an increasingly severe fire season year after year.