It’s been a trademark of the summer of 2026 throughout the county and elsewhere across the state.

This fact was driven home over the last week when a series of fires broke out around Roy on July 20, and a week later, the Adams Fire ravaged a hillside on the south side of Washington Terrace on Monday afternoon.

On Tuesday, Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands public affairs officer Karl Hunt told the Standard-Examiner that crews are still working on the fire area.

“Crews were on it all night monitoring it,” he said as of midday Tuesday. “We had crews back this morning to continue work. It’s currently at 25% containment and they’re working the line, working the interior to make sure they can secure that line so, if we have a wind event or any weather like that, it’s not going to blow out and start another fire.”

Photo supplied, Washington Terrace City Manager Tom Hanson

He said the size of the fire has been reassessed from the initially reported 75 acres to 45 acres following a more comprehensive mapping effort.

“Yesterday, 75 was just a rough estimate,” he said. “That always happens until they can get a chance to map it, and they’ll either do that by aircraft or by walking the perimeter. Yesterday they flew it with one of the helicopters that they had to make sure they had that acreage.”

Two people were injured in Monday’s fire — a Weber County Sheriff’s Deputy who was treated and released and a civilian. Reports indicate that the second person injured in yesterday’s fire has died, but as of press deadline, that had not yet been officially confirmed.

Hunt said that all evacuation orders were lifted by Monday evening and that damage has remained limited to a camping trailer that received substantial damage and minor damage to a home.

He said that a cause has yet to be determined at this time.

Rob Nielsen, Standard-Examiner

“We have investigators that are working the scene to determine what the actual cause was,” he said.

Washington Terrace City Manager Tom Hanson told the Standard-Examiner on Tuesday that he was happy to see so much assistance from regional resources.

“One of the biggest takeaways on this is how supportive our surrounding communities are for us and how supportive neighboring counties are in helping out with a situation like this,” he said. “We had Box Elder County, many, many resources in Weber County, some resources from Davis County came up and even some resources from Morgan County came down. There was also a North Dakota fire response team that was stationed in the area; they came up to help us out. The state Division of Natural Resources also came out — they brought a helicopter and helped with some aerial drops of water on some of the fire. And Hill Air Force Base also came out with their fire crew to help out. We had an amazing response.”

He said there was also a significant response from law enforcement agencies in the county that helped with evacuations during the fire.

Meanwhile, Roy is still assessing the full scope and cause of last week’s string of fires that destroyed several minor structures and three homes.

Rob Nielsen, Standard-Examiner

Roy City Fire Chief Theron Williams told the Standard-Examiner on Monday said that as of Monday, the total area burned is still being assessed.

“That’s something that we have to come up with and we have not got that done yet,” he said.

He said the same is true when it comes to assessing monetary damages due to the fact that nearly 30 outbuildings were destroyed in addition to the three homes and other miscellaneous items.

“The difficult part of that is that it’s more than a home — you have all of the outbuildings (sheds, dog houses and other structures),” he said. “A lot of people had different items in their yards from boats to vehicles, and we have not put that all together thus far.”

Williams said no injuries were reported to residents as a result of the fire though there were some first responders treated for heat exhaustion and smoke inhalation.

Roy Deputy Fire Chief Mike King told the Standard-Examiner last week that at least four distinct fire starts were observed in an area stretching along the Union Pacific Railroad/Utah Transit Authority tracks from 4400 South in Roy to north of Hinckley Drive near Ogden.

Williams said that ATF and Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands are continuing to investigate the cause of these fires and that nothing official has been established at this time.

“We work off of evidence that’s fact-based, not speculation,” he said. “We just don’t know, so until investigators can piece all of that together … we’re just going to keep it under investigation. Hopefully we’ll know more in the coming week or next week.”

He said that patience is needed to move forward.

“If everybody will be patient, we’ll come to the conclusion we hope to,” he said. “And just keep in mind the families that were affected by it. That’s where the focus really needs to be as they try to rebuild and try to find a way forward. We appreciate all of the outside help from the agencies. It was an overwhelming fire and we had an enormous amount of help from agencies outside of Roy.”

Hunt said wherever residents may be, it’s high time to be fire aware given the ongoing drought.

“It’s important, in the dry season that we have right now, to be super cautious,” he said. “It’s never too late to start to do some prep-work or mitigation around your home if you live in the wildland-urban interface — creating a sensible space around your structure allows firefighters the room to work and really defend your property if and when a wildfire does start.”