BEND, OR -- Deschutes County Emergency Manager Sgt. Nathan Garibay says he's preparing for a long and intense fire season, "We're seeing fire activity that typically we don't see until a little later in the summer. There's a lot of acres burning right now in Oregon, and we have a long season left ahead of us. We probably have two months left before a likely season-ending event."

Fires in Central Oregon have already led to more than half a dozen local evacuation orders; statewide, evacuations have impacted more than 100 communities. Sgt. Garibay says he's issued numerous fire evacuations this season, "The Darlene 3 Fire, McCaffrey Road Fire, which was up in Redmond. And then, we've had some small areas evacuated around both the Wickiup Fire, down near Wickiup Reservoir, as well as the Jackpine Fire, right on the Deschutes-Klamath County line."

He wants people to have a good understanding of the state's standardized evacuation levels: Level One - Be Ready, Level Two - Be Set and Level Three - Go Now, "Go Now is really just, there's imminent risk to your community, and fire managers can't guarantee that they can keep the fire out of your community. So we really do that as a preventative measure to keep life safety intact. And that's our primary- at that point, we want to make sure people are safe."

Garibay encourages families to think about how they would evacuate long before it's needed, including packing an emergency kit, deciding on a meeting place for extended family and keeping gas in your car, "If you have kids home from school during the summer and you work, do you have a plan in place for your kids to evacuate if they're not quite yet driving? Do you have a trusted neighbor or friend in the area that can pick up your kids if your neighborhood gets evacuated? Because it might be a challenge to get back home to get your kids." Similar plans should be made for pets left home alone during the day. 

He tells KBND News ordering an evacuation is never an easy decision, "I think some of the challenge we have is making sure that we get the right information out to the people and that people can make good, timely decisions for their own safety." Garibay says the community can help by signing up for local emergency alerts. He notes the houseless community faces additional challenges when it comes to evacuation notices, "Dealing with encampments that are scattered in undeveloped areas, it's making sure we can find them, notify them, get them out of the way. It just requires some different communication strategies."