{"id":41485,"date":"2022-03-27T23:36:46","date_gmt":"2022-03-28T05:36:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/firefighters-increase-containment-on-colorado-wildfire\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:01:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:01:26","slug":"firefighters-increase-containment-on-colorado-wildfire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/firefighters-increase-containment-on-colorado-wildfire\/","title":{"rendered":"Firefighters increase containment on Colorado wildfire"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"From
From left to right, Laura Tyson, Tod Smith and Rebecca Caldwell, residents of Eldorado Springs, watch as the NCAR fire burns in the foothills south of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Saturday, March 26, 2022, in Boulder. The NCAR fire prompted evacuations in south Boulder and pre-evacuation warning for Eldorado Springs. (Helen H. Richardson\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Helen H. Richardson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

BOULDER, Colo. \u2013 A wildfire south of Boulder that forced nearly 20,000 people to flee <\/a>was listed at 35% contained by Sunday afternoon and most evacuations had been lifted, officials with Boulder Fire-Rescue said.<\/p>\n

The fire, which ignited Saturday, burned to within 1,000 yards (914 meters) of homes on the west end of Boulder, said Mike Smith, incident commander. No homes were lost and no injuries were reported, he said.<\/p>\n

A quick initial attack \u201ccombined with all of the fuels mitigation treatments that we\u2019ve done in this area is one of the reasons that we\u2019ve had such great success,\u201d Smith said Sunday.<\/p>\n

\"A
A helicopter flies above the smoke from the NCAR fire as it burns in the foothills south of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Saturday, March 26, 2022, in Boulder, Colo. (Helen H. Richardson\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Helen H. Richardson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Fire crews were also able to use aircraft to fight the fire, laying down lines of fire retardant near homes in the rolling hills south of the college town, he said.<\/p>\n

The evacuation area was reduced late Saturday to cover about 1,700 people and 700 residences, down from about 8,000 homes earlier in the day. Fire managers hoped to allow more people back into their homes Sunday as the area becomes safe, officials said. New information for those still evacuated was expected by Sunday evening, Smith said.<\/p>\n

\"People
People watch as the NCAR fire burns in the foothills south of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Saturday, March 26, 2022, in Boulder, Colo. (Helen H. Richardson\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Helen H. Richardson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A
A helicopter flies above the smoke from the NCAR fire as it burns in the foothills south of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Saturday, March 26, 2022, in Boulder, Colo. The NCAR fire prompted evacuations in south Boulder and pre-evacuation warning for Eldorado Springs. (Helen H. Richardson\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Helen H. Richardson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Work on Sunday focused on reinforcing the fire line and making sure the fire didn\u2019t burn toward the city of Boulder or down toward Eldorado Canyon, Smith said. Crews were working to corral the fire into an area of rocks and snow.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday was a good day,\u201d Smith said during a Sunday afternoon briefing as a helicopter flew in the background. \u201cThis morning was a little bit cooler, the wind was a little bit calmer and as we moved through the day we were happy to see that some of the winds that were forecast didn\u2019t actually come to fruition.\u201d<\/p>\n

The containment level increased from 21% on Sunday morning to 35% on Sunday afternoon while the area burned remained the same \u2014 an estimated 189 acres (77 hectares), Smith said.<\/p>\n

The fire burned in dormant trees and dry grass not far from where a late December fire, pushed by strong winds, burned over 9 square miles (24 square kilometers) and destroyed more than 1,000 homes.<\/a><\/p>\n

Fire crews are concerned about the upcoming fire season, Smith said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is just a sign of the way things are going to go,\u201d he said. \u201cWe continue to work on our planning processes. We continue to work on the team building and work with our partners to make sure that we\u2019re as dialed as we can be. We\u2019re feeling good, but we\u2019re a little nervous about the upcoming season.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fire burned protected wildland near the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder police said. Authorities have called it the NCAR fire and its cause is not yet known, although officials have found the spot where it was believed to have started, Smith said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

lost after nearly 20,000 flee<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41486,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-41485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41485"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84983,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41485\/revisions\/84983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41485"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=41485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}