DENVER—Firefighters were battling a 1,110-acre wildfire on Friday in Park County that forced 100 people from their homes.
It was one of a dozen fires sparked by lightning strikes the day before, but most were controlled before spreading very far, said Steve Segin of the Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center, which coordinates firefighting agencies.
The Park County fire broke out near Guffey, about 130 miles southwest of Denver, and was burning on a mixture of grass and forest. Segin said the fire was 10 percent cotained Friday evening.
It more than doubled overnight but only a shed and a trailer have burned, county spokeswoman Linda Balough said.
At least 120 local firefighters were at the blaze and federal crews have been requested. The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it would reimburse Colorado for 75 percent of its firefighting costs.
No injuries have been reported in any of the blazes.
Among the other fires were a 6-acre blaze south of Buffalo Creek in the Pike National Forest and a fire burning on 7 acres in Devils Canyon in Jefferson County, Segin said.
The Park County fire is the main focus of fire managers, who diverted a hotshot crew that was on the way to the Buffalo Creek fire to Park County instead. A 20-person hand crew was sent to fight the Jefferson County fire, along with eight smoke jumpers.
The smoke jumpers had been on standby in Canon City because of the state’s high fire danger, Segin said.
The Rocky Mountain coordination center has sent 250 firefighters to California, where more than 1,000 fires are burning. Most of them were also sparked by lightning.
In Colorado, the fire danger is the worst in the southern part of the state below 8,000 feet because hot weather, winds and low humidity has been drying out grasses after a dry spring, Segin said. Relief could come in late July, when monsoon rains typically start moving into the Colorado.
A cool front moving across the state Friday was expected to lower temperatures by about 10 degrees, but that could still help churn up afternoon thunderstorms, which could in turn spark more fires. Unless sustained rain falls, those fires could smolder and flare up days later, Segin said.
“This is the time when everything is drying out,” said Chad Gimmestad, a forecaster for the National Weather Service in Boulder.
He said this winter’s heavy snowpack has helped stave off overall drought conditions. But he said the lack of spring and early summer rain has raised the fire danger and hurt dryland farmers who can’t tap irrigation water fed by the snowmelt.
Gimmestad said most of the spring rains fell south of Denver and west of Interstate 25. He said Denver International Airport has recorded only 3.04 inches of precipitation, including snow, this year. Last year at this time, 6.43 inches had fallen.
