“There’s been a lot of heartache”
On June 27 while driving home from the grocery store, Kay Smith noticed smoke swirling into the sky not far from her Forbes Park subdivision in the Sangre de Cristo mountains of Costilla County. “I saw it, and I just burst into tears,” Smith, 68, said. “I thought, ‘Oh, my God, no. This is exactly what we’d been hoping didn’t happen.’ ” Eight days later, as the rest of America celebrated Independence Day, Smith, her husband and their two dogs waited around an American Red Cross emergency center in Fort Garland, hoping they would find out some new information about their home and those of their neighbors in Forbes Park, a 400-home gated community filled with retirees and vacationers. Forbes Park is one of the more populated areas that has been consumed by the Spring Creek fire, which is burning in Costilla and Huerfano counties in southern Colorado. As of Wednesday morning, the fire had
burned an estimated 95,739 acres and had only 5 percent containment.
The Smiths believe their home is still standing after seeing a picture from a county official, but they have no idea what kind of damage heat and smoke may have caused.
Others such as Bob and Lea Price, “Deep South Texans” who spend six months of the year in Forbes Park, are in the dark.
“We have no clue whether we have a house or not,” Bob Price said. “I have neighbors calling me every day in tears, but I don’t know. There’s been a lot of heartache.”
The fire has become one of the largest in the state’s history. Dry conditions caused by snow shortages over the winter, steep terrain, shifting winds and summer heat have made it a challenge to control.
Fire officials are working hard to preserve the town of Cuchara, a historic village in a valley on the eastern side of the Sangre de Cristo mountain range in Huerfano County, said Ben Brack, a public information officer with the Spring Creek fire. Firefighters have burned off ground cover to deprive the Spring fire of fuel and have built trench lines around the town.
But strong winds have been blowing embers up to three-fourths of a mile, making it hard for firefighters to build barriers. Those embers have ignited spot fires across the area, Brack said. That has caused the fire to burn in a mosaic pattern across thousands of acres.
“The conditions on this fire have been unprecedented,” Brack said.
The wind was a challenge Wednesday for the 986 firefighters assigned to the Spring fire. The winds were blowing toward the west in the morning but were expected to shift east. So firefighters were sent to the west side to dig fire lines in the morning and reassigned to the eastern edge after lunch, Brack said.
The fires have destroyed a fiber-optic cable and at least one cellphone tower, Brack said. That’s created communication problems for residents on the western side of the blaze, including homes and businesses 30 miles away in Alamosa, where internet and cellphone service is erratic.
Those utility issues could cause those who have evacuated to be without a place to live for weeks if not months.
The evacuaees from Forbes Park were crossing their fingers Wednesday that they soon would be allowed back in the subdivision even if just for a few hours to survey the damage and collect belongings. Thus far, it has been too hot: Ashes continue to smolder and reignite, making it too dangerous to send inspectors to assess damage.
Of the 400 or so homes in the subdivision, officials have been able to assess damage only to about 200. Of those, 104 have been destroyed and 61 are OK, Brack said.
Price and his wife, Lea — both bluegrass musicians — remembered to pack their banjo, guitar and mandolin, but they forgot a photo album even though they had set it out to be taken when they fled the flames.
“No matter how much we all thought we could be prepared for this, we weren’t prepared,” Price said.
Bill Werner, disaster program manager for the American Red Cross of Colorado, said the center’s workers were doing everything they could to make people feel at home. About 400 people have been using the center at the Blanca/ Fort Garland Community Center as a resource, although most are staying in hotels in Alamosa. A few dozen have been sleeping there.
On Thursday, the center served Frito pie with green chili for lunch. Werner was making plans to later show a movie in the gym and to serve popcorn. Crisis counselors were on hand to soothe worried evacuees and calm emotions.
Smith was struggling with anger Wednesday. It was directed at someone who had been spreading rumors about whose homes had been destroyed. She had been told one day hers was gone, only to learn it was still standing a couple of days later. Others are angry at a lack of attention from Colorado’s elected officials, who they feel have ignored the situation.
Lea Price patted her friend’s shoulder and assured her it was normal to feel anger.
When Smith mentioned trouble sleeping and said she’d been awake since 4 a.m., Lea Price replied, “Me, too. You should have texted me.”
After eight days, living out of a hotel room with so little information on their homes was wearing thin, Lea Price said.
They are dreading the results because life in Forbes Park and other areas affected by the fire will never be the same. Some neighbors will lose homes and move away. It will take months to rebuild for those who want to stay. Besides homes, the picturesque views of treecovered mountainsides and wildlife wondering through backyards will be gone, she said.
“It’s going to be hard to see the beauty gone,” Lea Price said. “It’ll come back but not in our lifetimes like it was.”