Updated at 7:29 a.m. on July 31, 2024
Five subdivisions were evacuated overnight and early Wednesday morning in south Jefferson County because of a growing wildland fire in an unincorporated part of the county.
"This is really hard territory for our firefighters. It's very steep. It's a lot of timber, it's a lot of scrub oak. We had scrub oak flaming up last night, 30 to 50 feet at night," said Mark Techmeyer with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office at a media briefing Wednesday morning.
The sheriff's office and firefighters have been working to get hundreds of people evacuated from the Deer Creek Mesa, Sampson, Maxwell, McKinney, and Murphy subdivisions, going door-to-door and using LookoutAlert emergency notifications.
The Silver Ranch and Silver Ranch South subdivisions were also under pre-evacuation orders Wednesday morning, and there are road closures in the area. South Valley Road south of Ken Caryl Ranch, and Deer Creek Canyon east of Deer Creek are both closed.
The blaze, known as the Quarry fire, was first noticed by a sheriff's deputy on patrol and was considered a vegetation fire around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday. It’s burning west of Ken Caryl. The cause is unknown. There was "zero containment" as of 7 a.m. Wednesday, Techmeyer said. He described the area as residential and popular with day hikers, more so than overnight campers.
He was not optimistic about the conditions firefighters face as they work to contain the blaze, especially with two other wildfires burning near homes on the Front Range, which limits the help that one agency can get. The Alexander Mountain fire is burning near Loveland, and the Stone Canyon fire has spread near Lyons.
"Everything's stacked against us. We've got low resources, we've got treacherous terrain, we've got very flammable fuel, but we've got some of the best people in the business on it," Techmeyer said.
They also have to contend with high temperatures, forecast in the high 90s Wednesday, and rattlesnakes. "There's even an area in there called Rattlesnake Gulch. They're so prevalent in the area," Techmeyer said. "So we have a lot of things to be concerned about for our firefighters today."
There’s an evacuation center set up at Dakota Ridge High School in Littleton. Large animals are being evacuated to the Jefferson County fairgrounds.
“Fires like this that ‘stand up’ after the sun goes down and humidity goes up show just how dry the fuel (vegetation) is, and how receptive it is to fire,” tweeted West Metro Fire Rescue in the early hours Wednesday.
Just hours before the Quarry fire started, the agency reminded residents that fire restrictions were in effect.
Wildfires in Colorado
“It's dry and fire danger is VERY HIGH in West Metro's district,” West Metro wrote.
The Quarry fire was estimated at about 130 acres Wednesday morning but authorities planned to bring in aircrafts to get a more precise estimate.
Mark Baukus evacuated his home in the Maxwell area around 2 a.m. Wednesday. He said his son was awake playing video games, and tipped Baukus off about the need to leave. He said he's had to evacuate his home before over the 25 years he's lived here.
"Fires happen. This is where we live. This is certainly not the first fire around here," he said.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Denverite photographer Kevin J. Beaty contributed reporting.
