Texas fire is 2nd-largest in state history
Abbott declares disaster areas in 60 counties
The second-largest wildfire in Texas history raged across the state’s Panhandle along with several other major blazes Wednesday, prompting evacuations, destroying homes and triggering a temporary shutdown of the nation’s primary nuclear weapons facility.
The fires began on Monday but spread quickly the following day as strong winds, dry conditions and unseasonably high temperatures fueled rapid growth. By Wednesday morning, the largest blaze, Smokehouse Creek, stretched across more than 500,000acres – about 800 square miles – through several counties and into neighboring Oklahoma, according to the Texas A&M Forest Service.
The Smokehouse Creek fire, which is over half the size of Rhode Island, is among the largest wildfires the state has ever seen, second only to the 2006 Amarillo East Complex fires that claimed 12 lives and burned more than 900,000 acres.
To the south, the Windy Deuce Fire burned 90,000 acres of land, with 25% of the fire contained as of Wednesday afternoon. Another blaze, the Grape Vine Creek Fire, northeast of Amarillo, Texas, burned 30,000 acres and was 60% contained, according to the National Wildfire Coordinating Group.
Authorities have not said what might have caused the fires that ripped through the sparsely populated counties set amid vast, high plains. No injuries or deaths have been reported, but an untold number of buildings have been destroyed.
Hemphill County Emergency Management Coordinator Bill Kendall said about 40 homes were burned around the perimeter of Canadian, a rural town northeast of Amarillo. Kendell said the charred terrain looked “like a moonscape.”
Tresea Rankin filmed her home as it burned in Canadian. “Thirty-eight years of memories,” she said. “Two of my kids were married there. ... But, you know, it’s OK, the memories won’t go away.”
The intense blazes in Texas were among several wild weather events happening across the country, including tornadoes in Illinois and a swath of recordhigh temperatures in the eastern half of the nation.
Temperatures were expected to drop across the Texas Panhandle throughout Wednesday, according to the National Weather Service. A mix of rain and snow is forecast today before temperatures may rise again, meteorologists say.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for 60 counties to enable critical resources to be deployed to areas impacted by the wildfires. Some residents were told they could return to their homes Wednesday, but several towns remain under mandatory evacuations.
Several main roads and highways in the Texas Panhandle remained closed Wednesday and thousands of people were without power. According to a database maintained by USA TODAY, more than 12,000 utility customers in Texas were without power Wednesday afternoon.
The Smokehouse Creek Fire forced evacuations in the cities of Hemphill County, which sits about a hundred miles northeast of Amarillo. Several school districts throughout the country canceled classes on Wednesday.
Strong winds were blowing a blanket of smoke far south into Amarillo, creating hazardous conditions for those with respiratory conditions, the weather service warned.
Sid Miller, commissioner of the Texas Department of Agriculture, said in a statement that he’s “deeply concerned” about the wildfires’ impact on the state’s agricultural industry. “We stand in solidarity with our farmers and ranchers facing loss and destruction,” Miller said. “And we’re committed to supporting their recovery efforts every step of the way.”
The Windy Deuce fire triggered a shutdown Tuesday evening at Pantex Plant, the nation’s primary nuclear weapons assembly and disassembly facility. The plant, about 17 miles northeast of Amarillo, said in a social media post on X that fire barriers were being built “to protect plant facilities.”
On Wednesday, the facility announced it was reopening for normal operations.
The plant performs research and development in high explosives and serves as an interim storage site for plutonium pits removed from dismantled weapons, according to the Department of Energy. The roughly 16,000-acre site, which includes a huge buffer zone, is jointly operated by a contractor and Sandia National Laboratory on land owned by the energy department and Texas Tech University, according to Texas Health and Human Services.
Hutchinson County Emergency Management spokesperson Deidra Thomas, who answered questions from residents during a Facebook live stream on Wednesday, said several structures in Fritch, a small city about 35 miles north of Amarillo, have been completely destroyed and the area remains unsafe.
“I don’t think a lot of folks that live in the Fritch area probably are going to be prepared for what they’re going to see as they pull into town,” she said. “Some homes were completely lost.”
Thomas said the main road leading into Fritch was backed up with residents who were not allowed into the city because in many areas, especially across the south, fires were still active.
“They can’t even see house numbers,” she said, adding that emergency officials are focused on damage control. “We have not really had a chance to assess all the damage and figure out where to start.”
In a briefing Tuesday night, Jerry Langwell, Hutchinson County emergency management coordinator, said people would be “shocked” by the damage from the fires along the 13 miles between the towns of Fritch and Borger.
“There is still many, many fires still burning,” he said, and the resources to fight those fires are “very thin.”