Wildfires have burned 9,000,619 acres this year, 147% of the ten-year average

The National Interagency Fire Center’s morning situation report for Friday, October 2, 2026, puts the year’s burned area at 9,000,619 acres. The same page sets the ten-year average for that date at 6,106,514 acres, which makes 2026 run at 147% of normal. Fires are up too: 62,738 so far, against a ten-year average of 46,638, or 135%.

Those totals cover wildland fires reported nationally from every protection agency since January 1, summed in the report’s year-to-date table, and they are measured against the 2016 through 2025 average as of the same calendar day. A year-end comparison will look different, because the ten-year average itself keeps growing through the fall.

Year-to-date acres in the October 2 report

The situation report, issued at 0730 Mountain time by the National Interagency Coordination Center, lists the acreage by protection category and then totals it. The 9,000,619 figure is the sum of that row, and the report prints the comparison beside it: acres at 147% of the ten-year average, fires at 135%. Dividing the two acreage figures gives 1.47, so the percentage matches the raw numbers the agency prints. The fire count is the less dramatic of the two measures, which means 2026 has produced fires that are larger than usual and not only more numerous than usual.

The ten-year average between August 27 and October 2

The percentages did not rise through September. They fell. On August 27 the NIFC situation report showed 7,971,399 acres at 164% of the ten-year average and 51,434 fires at 127%. Between that report and the October 2 edition, 36 days apart, the burned total grew by 1,029,220 acres and the fire count by 11,304, yet the acreage share dropped 17 points to 147%. The cause is the yardstick. Working back from the printed percentages, the ten-year average for August 27 was about 4.9 million acres; by October 2 it had reached 6,106,514, an increase of roughly 1.2 million acres in five weeks. A typical recent year, in other words, was still adding acres quickly through September, and 2026 added fewer than that.

The fire count behaves differently. The implied ten-year average rose from about 40,500 fires to 46,638 over the same stretch, while 2026 added 11,304, so the fire share actually climbed from 127% to 135% even as the acreage share fell. Both ratios are computed by the agency against the same 2016 through 2025 window, so each one moves with the calendar as well as with the fires, and a single day’s percentage is a snapshot rather than a trend line.

The August 27 report also carried National Preparedness Level 5, the top of the five-step scale. The October 2 report lists Level 2.

Preparedness Level 2 and the fires still active

Preparedness levels are set by the National Multi-Agency Coordination Group using fuel and weather conditions, fire activity and the availability of suppression resources, and the NIFC definition of Level 2 says that “active geographic areas may require national support to accomplish incident management objectives,” with a low to moderate chance that drawing resources from quiet areas would pose a risk. At Level 5, by the same document, national resources are heavily committed and inactive areas are reaching drawdown levels. The drop from 5 to 2 in five weeks is the clearest sign in the report that the national pressure has eased even as the season’s total stays high.

Eleven large fires remained uncontained on October 2: seven in the Northwest Area, two in Southern California and two in the Southern Area. A total of 4,093 personnel were committed to incidents nationwide, 127 fewer than in the prior report. The report’s three largest incidents, Little Giant at 172,896 acres, Sinlahekin at 166,007 and Grasshopper at 93,972, account for 432,875 acres between them and sit in the Northwest, which is where most of the remaining uncontained fires are.

Annual records and the outlook

NIFC’s annual statistics table, compiled from these same situation reports, runs from 1983 to 2025 and shows the largest years topping 10 million acres, including 2015, 2017 and 2020. The 2026 total stands about one million acres short of 10 million with the year not yet finished. The center’s Predictive Services unit publishes a monthly outlook on the first working day of each month that maps above, normal or below-normal fire potential for the coming four months, and that product, not the daily report, is the NIFC document that says where the remaining acres could come from.

For the year as it stands on October 2, the report’s own numbers are the record: 9,000,619 acres, 62,738 fires and 11 uncontained large fires, with the preparedness level at 2.

This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.

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