It is a bit scary to think that sop far, neither last year’s big fires (waldo, RMNP) nor this year’s v(Royal Gorge, Black Forest) occurred in the “dangerous”, i.e. beetle killed, NW part of the state. when one of those hitsm, it may be Peshtigo redux.
There is one up on Wolf Creek Pass right now. Been burning for a couple of days now. There is another one close by in the west fork of the San Juan river drainage. That one is up in the Wimenuche Wilderness area. It is up to 2,500 acres as of today. The one on Wolf Creek pass is 3 miles south of the highway and Wolf Creek Ski area. We can see a large smoke plume from it. We were about 30 miles north of both fires this weekend and we watched the smoke all day. Fire was on the other side of a long ridge (several miles long) That is completely dead from beetles except for some small patches of Aspens. It is sad to see but it is natural. Natures way of cleaning and renewing. The problem is that so many houses are being built in these areas. It is scary to see and it is not a matter of if, only when these beetle killed areas go up.