After dodging the hotter-than-blazes bullet all summer, Rogue Valley residents are about to be blasted by both barrels.

Make that triple barrels.

The temperature should rise to the triple digits this afternoon, reaching as high as 102 degrees, according to the National Weather Service forecasters at the Medford airport.

The year’s first triple digit will follow with a broiling 104 on Friday and Saturday before dropping to a relatively tepid 100-degree high Sunday afternoon, forecasters said.

The previous high for the year was 96 on June 17.

Advertisement

But weather service spokesman Murray Orr, who has worked in the Medford office for a dozen years, shrugs off the heat. No records are expected to be broken in the next couple of days, he said.

"It’s typical summertime weather," he said.

The heat wave is part of a weather pattern pushing north from California, he said, noting the high temperatures should be dropping to the mid-90s by Monday.

But the increased heat is edging up the fire danger, observed Dennis Turco, the fire prevention officer for the Oregon Department of Forestry’s Southwest Oregon District.

"We’re already at the upper end of high," he said of the current fire danger. "There is a good possibility, with the dry wind, that we’ll probably be looking at going to extreme."

But that will only happen if the heat wave continues, he said.

Meanwhile, the ODF, which protects private, county, state and U.S. Bureau of Land Management brushlands, has brought in a D-7 air tanker from Redmond in the event thunderheads start boiling up on the horizon.

Although there was some lightning activity on the east side of the Cascade Range earlier this week, none has been reported on the west side.

"They’re still watching that threat now," Turco said, noting he wasn’t sure when the tanker would return to Redmond.

However, no lightning is expected in Jackson and Josephine counties through this weekend, according to the local weather service office.

The tanker is one of two based in Redmond that are available to the local ODF district.

Two air tankers now in Alaska are expected to arrive at the Medford airport under an ODF contract on Aug. 1.

Although those tankers can’t be used to fight wildfires on national forests, which are under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Forest Service, they can be used in areas where national forest and state-protected lands merge.

Most of the Forest Service’s aging air tanker planes have been grounded because of safety concerns, although the agency has eight military air tankers and five of its own tankers that can be used on national forests.

Both the Forest Service and the ODF have helicopters at their disposal to fight local wildfires as well as a sufficient number of firefighting crews, officials said.

Meanwhile, local residents must follow current fire restrictions to the letter, Turco said.

"With this hot weather we are reaching the point where fires are starting easier now," he said. "People have to be really careful."

Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at pfattig@mailtribune.com