7‚000 people flee north Colorado fires

Reuters

A wildfire raging on in Black Forest, Colorado, on Wednesday. Fire crews battled a wind-whipped wildfire on Wednesday that burned at least 92 homes in northern Colorado, forcing the evacuation of more than 1,000 inmates from a prison.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

COLORADO SPRINGS: A wildfire fuelled by hot temperatures, gusty winds and thick, bone-dry forests has destroyed 92 homes, damaged five more and prompted more than 7,000 residents in northern Colorado to flee, sheriff’s officials said yesterday.

A separate Colorado wildfire to the south has destroyed 20

structures, including some in Royal Gorge Bridge & Park, and prompted evacuations of about 250 residents and nearly 1,000 inmates at a medium-security prison. To the north, another fire burned in Rocky Mountain National Park.

Wildfires also were burning in New Mexico, Oregon and California, where a smokejumper was killed fighting one of dozens of lightning-sparked fires.

Crews were so busy battling blazes across the West that the US Forest Service said yesterday it was mobilising a pair of Defence Department cargo planes to help — a step taken only when all of the Forest Service’s contracted tankers already are in use.

The fire near Colorado Springs, one of several that broke out yesterday along Colorado’s Front Range, has prompted evacuation orders and pre-evacuation notices to between 9,000 and 9,500 people and about 3,500 homes and businesses, sheriff’s officials said. Some Colorado Springs residents were warned to be ready to evacuate, mostly because of a fear of flying embers spreading the fire into the state’s second-largest city. Sheriff’s officials also evacuated part of neighbouring Elbert County, including two camps with a total of about 1,250 children and adults. Bits of ash and the smell of smoke drifted into Denver, about 60 kilometres to the north, where the haze blocked the sun.

No injuries or deaths have been reported, but El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa said officials were trying to confirm the whereabouts of one person reported missing yesterday.

Firefighters tried to go where the person was last seen but were turned back twice because it was too hot, he said.