National Wildfire Preparedness Level Drops to 3 as Conditions Improve

The National Interagency Fire Center lowered the National Preparedness Level to 3 on Wednesday as improving weather and greater resource availability eased pressure on the country’s wildland firefighting system.

The change took effect at 7:30 a.m. MDT on Sept. 9.

Officials attributed the decrease to continued improvement in fire weather conditions across several geographic areas, increased availability of nationally shared firefighting resources and light ordering through the National Interagency Coordination Center.

National Preparedness Levels range from 1 to 5 and reflect wildfire activity, resource availability and the demand for crews, aircraft and equipment across the country. A decrease to Level 3 indicates that resources remain committed to incidents, but national demand has eased from the higher preparedness level.

Wildfire activity is continuing despite the improvement. NIFC reported 61 new fires nationwide Tuesday, including four new large fires. About 14,405 firefighters and support personnel were assigned to 59 large fires across the country Wednesday.

Oregon had nine large fires listed by NIFC, covering approximately 1.2 million acres. Firefighters were working on incidents in eight geographic areas nationwide.

So far in 2026, 53,802 wildfires have burned more than 8.4 million acres across the United States. During the same period in 2025, 48,327 fires had burned approximately 4.3 million acres.

The decrease in the national preparedness level does not automatically change local fire danger levels or public use restrictions. Those decisions continue to be made by the agencies responsible for individual forests and fire protection districts.

Current national wildfire information is available through the National Interagency Fire Center.

The preparedness levels definitions can be found here: https://www.nifc.gov/fire-information