The Cameron Peak Fire closed additional sections of the Roosevelt National Forest on Thursday as incident commanders looked at weather, terrain and the possibilities for fire growth.
“I know this is huge and there were a lot of folks hoping to get out into the woods this weekend, particularly with hunting plans, but we really did this to home in on the value of life and public safety that’s so important to us,” said Katie Donahue, Canyon Lakes district ranger.
The fire burning in the Poudre Canyon west of Fort Collins grew to 16,461 acres, though incident commanders said fire activity was less Thursday than on previous days due to the weather.
And a team of 646 firefighters attacked the blaze, creating fire breaks where they might be most successful at stopping the fire and protecting homes, not directly on the line but in the possible future path. Crews are attacking the fire both on the ground and in the air with 10 helicopters.
“Our firefighters are working hard and diligently to keep this fire as small as possible,” Jared Hohn, deputy incident commander, said in an online fire briefing.
While the fire is at zero containment, meaning that crews cannot say for sure it will not grow past the set fire breaks that teams are building, they have completed about 30% of the fire lines on the ground. A fire line is where crews remove vegetation and use natural features to build a barrier to stop the blaze from spreading.
“Right now, we’re at 0% contained on the fire, but that does not mean our firefighters aren’t doing good work,” Hohn said. “There’s a difference between containment and completion of line.”
Some rain that fell on the north and east side of the fire on Wednesday helped lessen the spread of the fire, and a boost in humidity on Thursday also resulted in a much less active fire, said Darren Clabo, a meteorologist with the fire management team.
“Most of the fire activity was in the southwest (Thursday) in the higher country on the west side of the fire,” Clabo said. “The entire fire showed less activity (Thursday) than it did in previous days, likely due to an increase in relative humidity.”
However, warmer temperatures, higher winds and less humidity — extreme fire weather — are in the forecast for Friday and over the weekend, Clabo said.
The Poudre Canyon Road is closed from Rustic to Kelly Flats, portions of Rocky Mountain National Park are closed, and now a wider section of the national forest is closed to help with firefighting efforts and the potential need for future evacuations if the fire grows, officials said.
The closure includes areas:
- West of County Roads 67J, 69, 63E and 27.
- East of the Colorado State Forest State Park; south of County Road 80 C.
- North of Rocky Mountain National Park and County Road 44H.
- Colo. 14 was closed Thursday night at Kelly Flats, not due to fire activity, but to allow larger vehicles a better place to turn around before Rustic.
“I absolutely get it, this is inconvenient,” said Donahue. “I also understand the timing for folks in the community, but I just want to reassure you that this is about safety. It’s not necessarily directly related to the behavior of the fire … It’s just us trying to get ahead of expected use for the weekend and this potential this fire has.”
"peak" - Google News
August 21, 2020 at 09:02AM
https://ift.tt/31gjXtp
Forest closures west of Fort Collins expand due to Cameron Peak Fire - Loveland Reporter-Herald
"peak" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2KZvTqs
https://ift.tt/2Ywz40B
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Forest closures west of Fort Collins expand due to Cameron Peak Fire - Loveland Reporter-Herald"
Post a Comment