If your usual dog trail runs anywhere near Mt. Hood, check the Grasshopper Fire’s InciWeb page before you check the trailhead parking situation. The fire has burned 83,642 acres as of Wednesday, Aug. 12, and containment actually dropped to 20% — lower than crews had achieved over the weekend. This isn’t a smoke-in-the-distance story anymore. It’s road closures, Level 3 evacuations, and a Portland sky that’s spent the better part of two weeks ranking among the worst air on the planet.

We’ve covered smoke season for Colorado’s trail towns already this month, and the AQI math is the same everywhere it shows up. What’s different here is how close this fire is sitting to one of the most dog-hiked mountains in the Pacific Northwest, and how many separate hazards (fire, closures, evacuation zones, hazardous air) are stacking on top of each other at once.

Quick Verdict: What’s Happening and What to Do

Detail	What You Need to Know
Fire size	83,642 acres, 20% contained, as of Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2026
Started	July 23, lightning strike in Wasco County
Personnel	More than 1,800, under a newly expanded unified command as of Aug. 12
Evacuations	Level 3 “Go Now” active in parts of Wasco and Hood River counties; Clackamas County at Level 1 “Be Ready”
Highway 35	Closed for 12 miles between US 26 and Parkdale, indefinitely
Mt. Hood National Forest	Area-wide closure through Dec. 31, 2026: 40+ trails, 31 roads, ~40 recreation sites
Portland air	Ranked the world’s most polluted major city the morning of Aug. 5, AQI 159
Your dog, today	Skip Mt. Hood entirely. Check AQI for your actual zip code before any Portland-area hike, indoors or out

Where the Fire Actually Stands Right Now

The Grasshopper Fire started July 23 from a lightning strike about four miles northwest of Sportsmans Park in Wasco County. It grew slowly at first, then didn’t. By Wednesday it had reached 83,642 acres (that’s roughly 130 square miles) and containment sits at 20%, a step backward from where crews were over the weekend.

That regression is why Wednesday brought a new unified command structure: the Southern Area Blue Incident Management Team joined the existing Oregon State Fire Marshal Blue team, with an Australia/New Zealand incident management team also folding in to add capacity. More than 1,800 personnel are now assigned, including additional strike teams of structural engines that arrived from California. Crews have been working past 2 a.m. on the toughest nights. Six homes and 15 outbuildings are confirmed destroyed, with roughly 200 more structures still considered threatened.

None of that is trending toward “almost done.” It’s trending toward “still actively fighting for ground,” which matters if you’re the kind of person who checks a fire map once and assumes it’s stale information a few days later. It isn’t. Check it again before you go anywhere near the east side of Mt. Hood.

The Evacuation Map: Who’s Under “Go Now” Orders

Evacuation levels run from Wasco County through Hood River County and into Clackamas County, and they’ve been shifting (mostly upward) for over a week.

Level 3 “Go Now” orders are active in parts of Wasco County, including the Sportsmans Paradise area, Badger Creek, and Shadybrook Road. Hood River County has its own Level 3 zones near the fire’s advance, including the area around Mt. Hood Meadows, which shut down for the rest of the summer season rather than risk reopening into an active fire zone. Clackamas County, further west, is currently at Level 1 “Be Ready,” a notice to have a plan, not an order to leave, but a level that’s already moved once this month as the fire pushed toward the wilderness boundary. A shelter is open at The Dalles Middle School for residents displaced from the eastern zones.

If any part of your regular route to a Mt. Hood trailhead runs through Wasco, Hood River, or Clackamas counties, don’t rely on a map you checked last week. Evacuation levels in an active, uncontained fire move by the day, sometimes by the hour, and county sheriff’s offices are the source that updates first, not your GPS app.

Highway 35 and the Forest Closure You Need to Know About

Two separate closures are shaping anything resembling a normal Mt. Hood trip right now, and they’re not the same thing.

Oregon Highway 35 (the route that connects Government Camp to Hood River along the mountain’s east side) is closed for 12 miles between US 26 and the community of Parkdale, indefinitely, per ODOT. That drive normally takes about 30 minutes. The posted detour runs over two hours. If your trip plan assumed you’d loop around the mountain on 35, that plan doesn’t work right now.

Separately, the Mt. Hood National Forest has an area-wide closure order in effect across the Barlow and Hood River Ranger Districts, running from Aug. 11 through Dec. 31, 2026, or until it’s lifted. More than 40 named trails are closed (Timberline Trail, Badger Creek Trail, Elk Meadows Trail, and Tamanawas Falls Trail among them), along with 31 forest roads and roughly 40 developed recreation sites, including popular campgrounds like Bonney Meadows and Polallie. The one notable exception: the Pacific Crest Trail itself stays open, though hiking into an active closure zone from either end is a bad idea regardless of what’s technically still legal.

We wrote about a wave of new dog-specific closures across federal land earlier this year, mostly for ecological reasons. This is a different animal: a life-safety closure tied to an active fire. But the practical lesson is identical: check the current order before you drive out, because “it was open last month” means nothing once a Forest Service closure order is signed. And if your dog isn’t acclimated to the elevation on Mt. Hood’s higher trails, our altitude sickness guide is worth a look for whenever the closure lifts and those routes reopen.

How Bad Is Portland’s Air Right Now?

Portland was ranked the world’s most polluted major city on the morning of Aug. 5, 2026, with an AQI of 159, solidly in the “Unhealthy” range, where the general population, not just sensitive groups, can experience respiratory symptoms. Central Oregon fared worse: Prineville hit “Hazardous” levels the same day, with AQI peaking at 670 around 10 a.m., a reading where officials recommend zero outdoor physical activity for anyone.

That’s not a one-city problem, either. An air quality advisory from Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality currently covers the Portland metro area plus Eastern Oregon counties (Crook, Harney, Hood River, Jefferson, Malheur, Union, Wallowa, and southern Wasco) and stretches into Eastern Washington as well. It’s expected to run through at least Friday afternoon, Aug. 14. High pressure and near triple-digit heat are keeping winds light, and Portland’s position between the Coast Range and the Cascades traps smoke close to the ground instead of letting it clear.

We laid out the full AQI-to-exercise breakdown for dogs in detail elsewhere, but the short version applies directly here: at 159, you’re past the point where a normal-length hike is a reasonable call for any dog, not just brachycephalic breeds or seniors. Dogs breathe faster and deeper than a resting human during exertion, and they can’t decide on their own to slow down when their airways start protesting.

What This Means If You’re Hiking (or Evacuating) With a Dog This Week

1. Check AirNow for your actual trailhead zip code, not your home address. Smoke concentration varies enough across the metro that a Portland reading and a Sandy or Estacada reading can differ meaningfully on the same afternoon.
2. Don’t attempt anything on Mt. Hood’s east side until the closure order lifts. That includes routes that look technically open on an old map. The current order supersedes it.
3. If you’re in an evacuation zone, your go-bag needs a dog section now, not when the order upgrades to Level 3. Food, water, leash, current vet records, and a recent photo in case you get separated during a chaotic exit.
4. Don’t leave a dog in a parked vehicle while you deal with evacuation logistics. Loading a car during a fire event is stressful and slow, and a closed car heats up fast regardless of what’s burning nearby. Our hot car guide covers how quickly that turns dangerous.
5. Treat anything at AQI 150 or above as a hard cancel for outdoor exercise, per the thresholds in our full AQI guide. Portland’s already been above that mark repeatedly this month.
6. If you smell smoke at all, trust that over an app reading that might be a few hours stale. Sensor networks lag real conditions during fast-moving smoke events.

Is This Going to Improve Soon?

Not on any timeline anyone’s willing to promise. Containment moved backward over the weekend instead of forward, which is the opposite of what you want to see nine days into an incident this size. The new unified command and the added international and out-of-state resources are a sign this fire has outgrown what the original teams could handle alone, not a sign it’s close to wrapping up.

Our take: don’t plan this week around “the smoke will probably clear” or “the closure will probably lift by the weekend.” Plan it around checking InciWeb, ODOT’s TripCheck, and AirNow the morning of, every day, until the advisories actually stop renewing themselves.

Bottom Line

The Grasshopper Fire has burned 83,642 acres and is only 20% contained as of Aug. 12, with more than 1,800 personnel now working it under an expanded unified command. Level 3 evacuations are active in parts of Wasco and Hood River counties, Highway 35 is closed for 12 miles between US 26 and Parkdale, and the Mt. Hood National Forest closure order takes more than 40 trails off the table through the end of the year. Layer hazardous-range air quality across the Portland metro on top of that, and this is a week to leave Mt. Hood off the itinerary entirely — not shorten the hike, skip it.

Check current conditions before you load the dog up. This is an active, evolving situation, and every number in this post can change by the time you read it.

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Fire status and personnel figures from InciWeb and OPB. Highway 35 closure details from KATU. Mt. Hood National Forest closure order from the U.S. Forest Service. Portland air quality ranking from IQAir. Prineville AQI reading from The Bend Bulletin. Eastern Oregon advisory extension from Oregon DEQ, via Elkhorn Media Group. Check current conditions at AirNow.gov and ODOT TripCheck before any hike near Mt. Hood. This is an active, evolving wildfire, and containment, closures, and air quality can all shift within a single day.