Perilous
Times and Climate Change
Wildfires continue to rage across six U.S. states, dozen
small towns evacuated
By Zelie Pollon | Reuters
Smoke rises into the air from a large forest fire which has
consumed a total of 82,252 acres as seen in this U.S. Forest
Service handout photo taken in Gila National Forest, New Mexico
May 25, 2012. REUTERS/U.S. Forest Service/Handout
Santa Fe, New Mexico (Reuters) - A wildfire burned out of control
for a fourth day in the steep mountains of southwestern New Mexico
on Saturday, one of several blazes that have consumed more than
200 square miles (520 square km) of rugged land in six U.S.
states.
Efforts to contain the blazes spreading in sparsely populated
areas of Arizona, Colorado, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah
have been hurt by gusting winds and tinder-dry late-spring
conditions.
Numerous small towns, including the historic Wild West mining town
of Mogollon - now nearly a ghost town - were ordered to evacuate,
as the spreading fire torched miles forest, brush and grass.
New Mexico's Whitewater-Baldy Complex fire, which was started by
lightning 10 days ago, had raged across 82,252 acres (33,286
hectares) as of Friday and officials said the area could now be
much larger than that.
"We know that there was significant growth yesterday, but we don't
have a hard and fast number," said Fire Information Officer Dan
Ware.
More than 580 firefighters and support crew have been fighting the
blaze.
"This is the biggest show in the country right now in terms of
fire size. So a lot of resources are available to us. We're just
not sure we'll be able to do a lot of flying," Ware said.
He said access to the fire had been the chief difficulty as it was
burning in very steep, rugged terrain where firefighters were not
able to cut through the brush and timber.
"Fire activity was so extreme yesterday we had to pull crews out,"
he said. "We're expecting another day like that today. With such
high wind levels and low humidity there's going to be big
potential for some major growth."
SMOKE OVER DENVER
Smoke from the New Mexico fire wafted north into the Denver
metropolitan area on Saturday, as firefighters battled a separate
wildfire burning on the Utah-Colorado border.
That 2,800-acre fire was burning in a remote area near Paradox,
Colorado, U.S Forest Service spokesman Steve Segin said.
He said there were only a few isolated ranches in the area and no
structures had been lost so far, although the wind-driven blaze
was "very active." He said the cause was under investigation.
Most of western Colorado has been put under a "red flag" warning
for wildfires due to hot temperatures, low humidity and high
winds, according to the National Weather Service.
More than 1,000 miles (km) to the east, a wildfire in Michigan's
Upper Peninsula had grown slightly to cover an area of more than
21,000 acres by Saturday, stretching in a narrow band 11 miles
long from about 14 miles north of the village of Newberry to Lake
Superior, the state's Department of Natural Resources said.
Dry conditions posed problems at the northeastern end of the
blaze, where firefighters have concentrated efforts dropping water
from air tankers, Dean Wilson, a spokesman for the state DNR's
western fire management team, said on Saturday evening.
The DNR said access to was has been dubbed the "Duck Lake Fire"
was difficult and it was only 20 percent contained on Saturday
morning. It said a number of structures had been damaged or
destroyed.
Wilson said good progress had been made in tackling the south end
of the fire and firefighters were establishing defensive lines on
the east and west sides.
There have been no further evacuations and the defensive lines
around the Pike Lake area where there is a resort and Little Lake
Harbor held on Saturday, Wilson said.
In Utah, officials said a wildfire burning on the west side of
Promontory Point, the tip of a peninsula that juts into the Great
Salt Lake, had grown to 4,200 acres, but was 50 percent contained.
The fire, touched off by lightning on Thursday, was burning uphill
in the Promontory Mountains, on public and private land, the
officials said. No structures have been lost, they said.
(Additional reporting by Jennifer Dobner in Salt Lake City, Keith
Coffman in Denver, Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles and David Bailey in
Minneapolis; Editing by Jackie Frank and David Brunnstrom)