Up in Smoke

The day after my last post, Saturday June 23, I headed to Wal-Mart in the afternoon for some groceries.  The minute I opened the garage door I saw a plume of smoke on the mountainside.  As I drove to the store, I turned the radio on to see if I could get any information about what I was seeing.  And the closer I got, the larger the plume seemed to be.  The radio quickly informed me that there was indeed a fire on the mountain right outside of the city and that they were working on it.  I called Reid from the parking lot and told him to take a look, which he did.  It really wasn't until later that evening when we realized that the fire was still burning, and after listening to some media commentary, that we realized that this fire had the potential to be quite dangerous.

Over the next two days the fire continued to grow.  By Tuesday morning (the 26th) the fire was at 5,000 acres and only 5% containment.  The smoke in the area was getting bad and we were growing increasingly concerned about Finn's lungs.  That afternoon I needed to pick something up in the Springs and so we made our first trip closer to the base of the fire.  The smoke had been particularly bad that whole day (even up in Monument) so we were cautious to not get out of the car much.  But I did take a few pictures.

Looking out our basement in the early days of the fire

Driving in Colorado Springs

Just under an hour after we returned to our home, the worst-case scenario began to play out on the mountain.  The wind that had rolled in with an afternoon storm (quite typical around here) pushed the fire up and over the crest of the mountain.  And while a fire normally goes down a hill much more slowly than it'll go up, this was not the case.  The fire came barreling down the mountain straight towards homes.  The flames were in excess of 100 feet and apparently a wildfire burns hotter than a house fire (who knew?).  The firefighters pretty much had to retreat.  Thankfully the neighborhood had enough time that they were able to clear it out.  But it was still disasterous.  The interstate was closed southbound for several hours, and the firefighters were calling for assistance from where ever they could find it.  At the start of the day Tuesday there were about 400 firefighters on this fire.  By the end of the day we were up to over 800 firefighters with more on the way.  Wednesday morning the fire was at 15,000 acres burned and still only 5% containment.  There were 32,000 people evacuated from their homes.  And I was tense with worry about the smoke and Finn.

While driving along I-25 the fire began to crest the mountains.  See the 100 foot  tall flames!

The smoke was blowing right towards Monument.
This road is the divider between Colorado Springs and Monument.  To the right,
Colorado Springs.  To the left and under the smoke, Monument.

The view from our deck as it all unfolded.

The smoke above our chimney.  It was only 4:30pm.  The sun was still out!

Our our front door

Another view of the city completely engulfed in smoke

As night began to fall we could see the flames shooting up from the burning houses right from our deck.
As each house caught fire, more flames would shoot up into the sky.  They would eventually begin to fade and then another house would join the group.  I got up at 3am to check on Finn and could see a wall of flames along the mountain.  Absolutely tragic!

More houses burning

Thankfully Wednesday they were able to hold the fire to just a couple thousand acres of growth.  Even during the afternoon wind they were able to hold their lines, and that was quite a positive boost.  Thursday and Friday were good weather days and gave the men and women out there some time to gain ground on the fire.  The city was able to get in and assess the damage by Thursday.  To date they have reported that 346 homes have been lost, 2 bodies were found inside one home (making them the only casualities reported to date), the Flying W Ranch was a complete loss, and 17,000 acres have burned.  As of this evening, the fire is 45% contained.

We are still not out of the woods, however, but we are very happy with the great progress that has been made.  A pre-evacuation order still stands for all of the land to the west of I-25 and north of the Air Force Academy.  This includes land just less than a mile from our home.  The smoke continues to burn, at times more densely than others.  Sometimes the wind brings it right into our house, and other times it just seems that whatever is burning is more smoky than other fuels.  But I do hope (and feel) that the worst is behind us.  We do, however, keep a close eye on the situation and keep Finn tucked away inside.

As most of you are aware, this has been a particularly bad fire season in the Rocky Mountains.  It seems that  Utah and Colorado are going up in smoke.  In some ways, I feel that our summer plans are doing the same, as we cannot allow Finn to breath this air.  We have been praying for the firefighters every day, as well as for rain to come to our area.  Tomorrow I will be fasting for that very same thing.  It's so sweet to hear Finn take iniatitive to pray for the fire in his nighttime prayers.  I know that the Lord has been blessing us with this great weather these last 4 days and I pray that He will continue to do so.  We will be so grateful to see this fire extinguished and our community begin the process of recovery.

**This was written this past Saturday June 30th.  Since I wrote this post, the fire fighters have made tremendous progress.  The fire is now at 55% containment and has be held to just over 17,200 acres burned.  The smoke still lingers, though.