Early Winter
Ashes in the Air: Early Winter in from the Portland Oregon Wildfires of September 2017
No, it wasn’t early winter in Portland. But the gray flakes falling quietly from the sky made it look like a snowstorm. In reality, those weren’t snowflakes at all—they were ashes. Fine, weightless fragments of the wildfires that tore through the forests just outside the city limits in September 2017.
And no, it wasn’t a partial solar eclipse. The sky dimmed, the sunlight faded, and a strange golden glow blanketed the city. But this was no celestial event. What we witnessed was smoke—dense, suffocating smoke that drifted into Portland and cast a haze over everything.
I took a photo that day. The image captured the sun, barely visible through a thick curtain of smoke, glowing like a dim ember in a colorless sky. Trees stood still beneath a blanket of ash, and the familiar skyline looked muted and surreal. That photo remains a stark reminder of the fragility of our environment and the power of nature to alter our everyday reality in a matter of hours.
The 2017 wildfires were ignited by human activity and intensified by dry conditions, high temperatures, and wind. As flames surged through the Columbia River Gorge, an iconic natural area beloved by Oregonians and tourists alike, thousands of acres burned and trails were closed for months. Ash coated cars, porches, and sidewalks. Air quality alerts blanketed the region.
For more about the impact of wildfires on Oregon’s forests and recovery efforts, I recommend reading this in-depth report by Oregon Wild.
It wasn’t early winter in Portland. And it wasn’t an eclipse. Rather it was something more urgent—a visual and visceral warning about the environmental balance we so often take for granted.
Let’s not forget it.