Authorities ordered the evacuation of 60 more homes in western Colorado today as a wildfire spread to at least 800 acres and sent white and yellow smoke billowing into the sky.
No structures had burned, but a total of 90 homes had been evacuated since Monday and 110 others were considered threatened. One firefighter suffered a hand injury, said Suzanne Silverthorn, a spokeswoman for fire commanders.
It was not immediately known how many people had left their homes. Three people checked into a school used as a shelter for evacuees in New Castle.
Crews planned a back burn, a small fire started intentionally to head off the flames of a wildfire. Erratic winds spread the fire Monday afternoon and caused crowning in trees on the east side of a drainage, prompting the additional evacuations.
“It’s been a really scary fire. Its behavior has been bizarre. We’re struggling to get a handle on it,” Garfield County Sheriff Lou Vallario said.
Chuck and Beverly Johnson were packing personal items Tuesday afternoon after being ordered to leave their home in Canyon Creek Estates.
“They said we had to leave. We never did leave during Storm King even though they told us to,” said Chuck Johnson, a retired forester. “We are getting our valuables, paintings and getting out of here. The smoke from the fire is tremendous. The southwest wind is really driving the thing.”
The fire was burning a few miles from the site of the July 1994 Storm King Mountain wildfire that killed 14 firefighters.
Bureau of Land Management spokesman David Boyd said the fire was moving east, toward the homes. Boy said the flames were within a half-mile of houses.
The fire was burning in steep terrain covered with brush pinon pine and juniper trees and dotted with rural subdivisions between New Castle and Glenwood Springs, about 160 miles west of Denver. Containment was listed at zero percent.
A second fire in a remote and rugged area near the town of Cameo, 180 miles west of Denver, had reached 1,000 acres by Tuesday morning but had not grown further by evening, BLM spokeswoman Mel Lloyd said. A containment line was dug around 80 percent of the fire and two of the three aircraft on the fire were released.
About 120 firefighters remained at the scene.
A third blaze was contained Monday night after charring four acres outside the town of Parachute.
All three fires were blamed on lightning strikes Sunday.
About 200 firefighters, three heavy air tankers, two helicopters, two single-engine tankers and six fire engines were battling the fire near New Castle, and more crews were on the way.
The wind began to pick up Tuesday afternoon, as fire managers feared, and tongues of flame and black smoke were visible within the white plume.
Dan Thimsen, 51, had to evacuate during the 2002 Coal Seam fire, which started in the area when vegetation on the surface was ignited by a long simmering undergound fire. When he evacuated Tuesday, he grabbed “20 years of kid memorabilia,” some guitars, guns and his two dogs.
“This area is so free of the other disasters going on around the country, hurricanes, floods. You think you’re safe, and all of a sudden, nature does something like this,” Thimsen said.
