Colorado is blazing again.
And that’s not a weed pun.
A gigantic wildfire is raging across the Rocky Mountain State. The wildfire has nearly doubled in size since over the last few days. Arid conditions and harsh winds have propelled the fire across southwestern Colorado.
Nearly 6,880 hectares had been enveloped in flame by Sunday afternoon. The fire had covered an area larger than Manhattan. 800-plus firefighters were called up to fight to blaze, but only about ten percent of the fire was contained as of Sunday.
More than two thousand homes have been evacuated in the area affected by the fires. Police and other law enforcement officials were going door to door, and emergency alerts were sent by phone, texts, and emails.
So far no structures have been destroyed, but the fire was only a few hundred yards away from some homes. Aircraft dropped water and flame retardant to battle back the progress mad by the fire. The rough terrain in the area affected by the fire has rendered ground-based firefighting techniques largely ineffective. The fire isn’t projected to be fully contained until the end of June.
Low humidity in the area, combined with high winds, have firefighters concerned that the blaze will keep spreading over the next few days. The National Weather Service has issued a red flag warning of “extreme fire danger” for large areas of the “Four Corners” region of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona.
The San Juan National Forest is also under threat from wildfires, and air quality warnings have been issued by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment due to the extreme levels of smoke caused by the fires in the area.
This is only the latest massive wildfire to impact the US in the last few years. In 2017, more than 4 million hectares of land were burned by wildfires in America.
Fires in California, Montana, Florida, Idaho, Texas, and Washington destroyed more than $29 billion dollars worth of homes and property. The US Forest Service spent more than $2 billion dollars fighting fires last year.
And with this latest outbreak in Colorado, it seems that the season of flame has not yet come to an end.