Wildfire smoke makes the sun glow orange through the trees near Sisters on Wednesday. A U.S. Forest Service sign provides information on fire restrictions. 

Triple-digit temperatures and thick smoke that are baking and blanketing Central Oregon can be difficult on the region’s homeless population who are particularly vulnerable to the unhealthy conditions outside.

Bob Bohac, the outreach director for Redmond nonprofit Jericho Road, said the smoke and the heat can be deadly. In the summer of 2021, three homeless residents died from exposure to the elements, but Bohac said seeking shelter can also have consequences.

“It’s an incredibly difficult time for folks who are in the junipers because they know that if they do come into town to a cooling shelter, they are leaving their stuff alone,” Bohac said, referring to land managed by the Bureau of Land Management east of Redmond where unhoused people live. “And chances are something will be missing when they get back out there, but if they stay out there it is really, really, really miserable. It is a horrible dilemma.” Central Oregon remains under both an excessive heat advisory and an air quality alert, according to the National Weather Service office in Pendleton. No real relief is expected before Saturday.

Redmond baked at 105 degrees on Tuesday, breaking the town’s 103-degree record set in 2020. Bend topped out at 102 degrees Tuesday, with more heat and smoke to come, as the Lookout, Bedrock, Salmon, and Wiley Creek fires burn in the Willamette National Forest where the fire danger as of Wednesday was designated as extreme.

Temperatures in Redmond were forecast to reach 102 or 103 degrees on Wednesday, but then expected to gradually start cooling off, a trend that holds for the rest of the region moving into the weekend.

While most of the smoke in Central Oregon was coming from fires in the Willamette National Forest, the Fuzztail Fire south of Bend and the Johnson Saddle Fire near Prineville were also contributing, said Kaitlyn Webb, fire prevention officer with the U.S. Forest Service.

The smoky air and the heat forced people in the region to stay indoors, and shelters have opened to give homeless people a reprieve from the hazardous conditions.

In Redmond, Mountain View Fellowship church, in partnership with Shepherd’s House Ministries, opened a relief shelter that’s expected to remain open Thursday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., said Cathy Helie, the church’s administrator.

Helie estimated that nine people showed up to the shelter Tuesday night shortly after the smoke began moving into the region. She said the shelter will provide snacks, water and a place to take a nap for people that need it.

Dave Notari, the director of development at Shepherd’s House Ministries, said there are beds and shelters in both Bend and Redmond for the community to escape the unpleasant conditions. He said on Wednesday, Shepherd’s House was still assessing the situation as smoke is expected to persist until the weekend.

“We are still anticipating that we will see an increase. We haven’t seen a really significant increase yet, but we have at the Lighthouse (the Shepherd’s House’s navigation center) in Bend, opened our day room for a smoke shelter and the heat,” Notari said. “So, that is an option for people, but currently that is not being greatly impacted. We anticipate though throughout the day as more people are impacted that that will change. We did have a couple of medically fragile folks that stayed with us last night and into today because of the smoke. So, it is having an impact.”

In Bend, the capacity is 100 beds for overnight guests, but Notari said Shepherd’s House is prepared to expand capacity as needed in shelters in both Bend and Redmond.

The weather service said both the heat warning and air quality alert will remain in effect until 11 p.m. Thursday, which is when a changing weather pattern is expected to dislodge the stagnant air and smoke that have settled in the region, said Roger Cloutier, a weather service meteorologist.

“The winds have been fairly light in both Bend and Redmond. They are only variable at 3 miles an hour, so the smoke that has drifted in there from the wildfires over the Cascades overnight kind of settled along the east slopes of the Cascades and further east,” Cloutier said.

Cloutier said the smoke is so thick, it is producing an overcast layer at 2,600 feet, which he said will most likely impact aviation. He said starting Thursday afternoon and into Friday, a weather system from the northwest will cause winds to pick up and bring some relief.

“The smoke that is over you now, it will blow it out,” Cloutier said Wednesday. “However, it will blow more smoke from west of the Cascades into the area. Even if it clears the smoke out, more smoke is probably going to come in from the west, but at least it will be moving, so there will be some improvement, better mixing anyway — rather than just having stagnant smoke.”Relief will arrive on Saturday when winds will come from the north, Cloutier said.

“A north wind is going to blow the smoke southward. And there is not a whole lot of smoke to the north, so it will be much better air quality by Saturday afternoon,” Cloutier said.

The air quality in Central Oregon hit the hazardous and very unhealthy levels on Wednesday with AQI levels hovering in the upper 200s in Bend and in the 400s in Sisters, according to some readings. Good to moderate air quality is anything between 0 and 100 on the air quality index.

The smoke also put a damper on some events. It prompted the cancellation of a show by My Morning Jacket on Wednesday night at Hayden Homes Amphitheater in Bend.

In Redmond, numerous events were canceled Wednesday including all outdoor activities for the Redmond Area Parks and Recreation District. Herringbone Books, and Initiative Brewing also closed because of the poor air quality.