DHundreds of homes have been destroyed and at least 33,000 people forced to evacuate their homes by fires in Colorado, a western US state battered by high winds and facing a historic drought, officials said. In Boulder County, hotels, shopping centers and more than 650 acres of greenery have gone up in smoke. “About 370 homes around Sagamore were destroyed. And it’s possible 210 homes were destroyed in Old Town Superior, ”Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle said at a press conference Thursday.
The city of Boulder, which has more than 100,000 inhabitants, is located about fifty kilometers from Denver, the capital of Colorado. This state is experiencing a historic drought which has greatly facilitated the spread of the flames. And gusts of wind of more than 160 km / h were observed in some places, complicating the efforts of the firefighters. “Given the scale and intensity of this fire and its presence in such a densely populated area, we would unfortunately not be surprised if there were any injuries or deaths,” Sheriff Joe Pelle warned.
“Leave Louisville or your life will be in danger”
According to the newspaper Colorado Sun, several people had to be treated for burns, of which at least six were hospitalized. Fortunately, the winds are expected to ease, the National Weather Service said late Thursday evening, and heavy snowfall is expected over the next two days. In all, more than 33,000 people were ordered to evacuate, including Louisville, a city of 20,000 residents, and Superior, 13,000 residents. “Leave Louisville or your life will be in danger”, had insisted the meteorological services.
“Strong winds quickly spread the flames and all the planes are grounded,” tweeted Jared Polis, the governor of this mountainous state where the Rockies meet the Great Plains. He also declared a state of emergency, and underlined the danger of this fire which, unlike the previous ones, does not affect only rural areas. “The region that is affected is an ordinary suburb, like the one in which you live, those in which we all live,” he said.
Colorado in the throes of frequent droughts
Superior was covered in a cloud of dark smoke on Thursday, according to images posted on social media. Patrick Kilbride, 72, was at work in a hardware store when he was ordered to evacuate, the local newspaper reported Denver Post. The 72-year-old rushed to his home in Superior to collect his belongings but was unable to save anything other than his car and the clothes he was carrying on his back. Her cat and dog died in the flames. “All that’s left is ashes,” he said of the house he lived in for three decades. “It’s a strange feeling to go from a situation where you have all the comforts possible to have absolutely nothing,” he told the Denver Post. Patti Holtz described the terror felt upon evacuating her Boulder County home. “Everything is in flames. There are embers everywhere. I am very afraid, of course, with the wind, that it will continue to spread to other houses, ”she said.
“It was so dark you couldn’t see a thing. It was like the darkness of the night, ”she said again. Like much of the American West, Colorado, an already arid state, has struggled with exceptional drought for several years. With global warming, the intensity and frequency of drought and heatwave episodes are likely to increase further, continuing to create ideal conditions for forest or bush fires. In recent years, the American West has experienced unprecedented fires, particularly in California and Oregon.
For Daniel Swain, a meteorologist at UCLA, it is “hard to believe” that these fires take place in December, a period usually not conducive to this type of event in the region. “But take a record-breaking heat and drought fall, only two centimeters of snow so far this season, and add a storm with extreme downward gusts … and the result is extremely dangerous, very fast moving fires,” the researcher tweeted.
