Fast-moving wildfires scorch thousands of acres across the West, and there’s more danger ahead

By Kate Petersen, Alaa Elassar, Karina Tsui, Chris Dolce, CNN

(CNN) — Dozens of wildfires are raging across the western United States, burning homes and national forest lands and forcing the evacuations of entire towns, as officials restrict fireworks in some areas and caution residents about fire risks ahead of the Fourth of July and the nation’s 250th anniversary.

Low humidity, dry vegetation and strong winds are driving the rapid growth of already established fires and sparking new blazes throughout the central West.

A set of red flag warnings — an alert indicating a combination of conditions favorable for wildfires: high temperatures, low humidity and strong winds — was issued through Wednesday evening across a large area of Colorado and southeast Utah. Additional red flag warnings and fire weather watches are in effect for Thursday across parts of the region.

In southern Colorado, the Aspen Acres Fire ignited Monday morning and within hours had exploded to more than 23,000 acres, prompting evacuations of thousands of people across two counties. The fire had burned nearly 35,500 acres and was still 0% contained as of Wednesday afternoon, according to a post on X from the Pueblo County Sheriff’s Office.

On Saturday, three firefighters were killed battling the Snyder Fire along the Utah-Colorado line. The crew was overtaken by a fast-moving blaze with no viable escape route or safety zone, the US Wildland Fire Service said. Two additional firefighters were injured during the same incident.

Marilyn Wren, who has lived in Beulah, Colorado, for more than 35 years, was away when the Aspen Acres Fire began and couldn’t get back to her home before it was too dangerous.

She hoped the flames spared her house, but she received a photo from a friend confirming her worse fears: One of her properties, the one she’d lived in, had burned down in the blaze, she told CNN affiliate KOAA.

“You cry, you pray. It’s sorrow. It’s sadness,” she told the news station. “Literally everything we owned over the course of our lifetimes, every memento, every photo, every piece of jewelry, everything, it’s gone.”

About 125 structures in the county have been destroyed in the fire, Pueblo County Sheriff David Lucero said during a news conference Wednesday. It is unclear, however, what kind of buildings have burned because teams haven’t been able to go in to assess the damage due to the dangerous conditions, he added.

Dangerous fire weather conditions are expected to continue through the rest of the week, worsening near the week’s end, meaning there’s no end in sight for the beleaguered region.

“This is the number one fire in the nation … Every resource that we can get that we need will be brought to bear,” said Phil Daniels, incident commander from the Colorado Department of Fire Prevention and Control.

Evacuations ordered as tens of thousands of acres burn in Colorado

At least 12 wildfires were burning across Colorado as of Wednesday morning, according to state data, and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has issued several emergency declarations across the state.

One of those declarations was in Mesa County in response to the deadly Snyder Fire, which burned more than 30,000 acres in western Colorado and patches of eastern Utah as of Wednesday morning. Polis also authorized the state’s National Guard to support response efforts.

To the east, evacuations are in place for areas across Colorado’s Pueblo and Custer counties as the Aspen Acres Fire continues to be a threat. While weather conditions and firefighting efforts helped manage some of the fire growth Tuesday morning, high winds in the afternoon were a concern in the effort to keep it under control, Lucero said.

Evacuations have also been ordered for areas around the Willow Fire in central Colorado’s Lake County and the Gold Mountain Fire in southwestern Colorado’s Ouray County, and other fires have sprouted up around the state.

Many counties across Colorado instituted fire restrictions, including banning fireworks, ahead of the Fourth of July, but Polis also encouraged people “to exercise personal responsibility” with fireworks or other things that might start a fire.

“We owe it to the firefighters on the front lines to prevent new fires from starting,” he said during a news conference Monday.

Utah’s unprecedented fire conditions drive city-sized blaze

Last week in neighboring Utah, severe fire conditions drove the National Weather Service office in Salt Lake City to issue its first-ever “particularly dangerous situation” red flag warning for central and southern parts of the state.

Now, 12 fires encompassing nearly 300,000 acres are burning across the state.

The Cottonwood Fire, situated largely in Utah’s Fishlake National Forest, had burned more than 93,000 acres as of Tuesday night, an area bigger than Salt Lake City. It is only 5% contained, according to data from InciWeb, a clearinghouse for wildfire information in the US. Evacuations remain in place for the blaze.

The blaze is the most destructive wildfire – measured by number of structures lost – on state record, Kayli Guild, a spokesperson for the state division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands, said Wednesday without detailing the number. The destruction includes cabins, ski resorts, campground structures and primary homes, Guild said.

An estimated 150 structures have been lost in the fire, Great Basin Team 5 spokesperson Alyssa Mason told CNN Tuesday. Assessments were ongoing, and crews expected to find additional losses, she said. Firefighters were able to make good progress in furthering the fire’s containment due to better weather conditions Tuesday, the US Forest Service – Fishlake National Forest said Tuesday evening.

Before the Cottonwood Fire ignited, the 2018 Dollar Ridge Fire, which destroyed 74 homes, was considered the most destructive fire in Utah history, Karl Hunt, another spokesperson for the state forestry and fire division, told CNN.

Dozens of miles north of the Cottonwood Fire, the Wild Goose Fire ignited near Holden, Utah, on Friday, and has burned more than 11,000 acres and is 24% contained, according to Inciweb data.

The Wild Goose Fire has burned largely in the Fishlake National Forest, like the Cottonwood blaze to the south. The US Forest Service closed parts of the forest because of the fires.

Farther southeast, the Babylon Fire prompted the Manti-La Sal National Forest to issue an emergency closure Sunday. Part of Canyonlands National Park was also closed. As of Tuesday afternoon, more than 48,000 acres were burned, the US Forest Service-Manti-La Sal National Forest said.

Last week, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox announced Fourth of July firework restrictions statewide in an effort to prevent new wildfires.

More dangerous fire weather ahead

Much of western and central Colorado and parts of eastern Utah be will under a critical – level 2 of 3 – risk for fire weather Wednesday through Friday, according to the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center.

During those days, wind gusts are likely to be strongest in the late morning though the afternoon, peaking between 20 and 35 mph.

A larger break from stronger winds could take hold sometime this weekend into early next week, but the region will remain parched.

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CNN Meteorologist Dakota Smith and CNN’s Chris Boyette, Amanda Musa, Taylor Romine, Hanna Park and Cindy Von Quednow contributed to this report.