Forest fires | More than 500 homes potentially destroyed in Colorado

(Superior) Hundreds of homes were destroyed by fires on Thursday in Colorado, a state in the west of the United States that is battered by high winds and facing a historic drought, officials said.

“About 370 homes in the Sagamore subdivision were destroyed. It is possible that 210 homes were destroyed in the old town of Superior, ”Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle said at a press conference.

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. In Boulder County, hotels, shopping centers and more than 650 acres of greenery have gone up in smoke.

Gusts of more than 160 km / h were observed in some places, complicating the efforts of the firefighters.

“I would like to emphasize the scale and intensity of this fire and its presence in such a densely populated area, we would not be surprised if there were injuries or deaths,” the sheriff warned. Joe Pelle.

According to the newspaper Colorado Sun, several people had to be treated for burns, of which at least six were hospitalized.

Images broadcast by CBS showed a burning apartment building that firefighters were trying to put out.

Thousands of residents have been ordered to evacuate, especially in Louisville, a city of 20,000 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.

“Only ashes remain”

Another city targeted by a full evacuation order, Superior, 13,000 inhabitants, was covered Thursday in a cloud of dark smoke, according to images posted on social networks.

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 things, 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 weird feeling to go from a situation where you have all the comforts you can get to having 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.

“Like the black of the night”

“It was so dark you can’t see anything. It’s like the dark 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 droughts and heatwaves 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, meteorologist at UCLA University, 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.