“The only thing I’m anxious about is the wind”, area resident Maneul Urban told KOAT.com, “because if it picks up, then there’s nothing that is going to stop that fire”.
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About 800 firefighters and fleets of aircraft are battling flames in steep terrain and 70-year-old accumulations of brush. Residents packed their vehicles with clothes, photo albums and other belongings, and some loaded animals into livestock trailers as a wall of smoke loomed between them and the border of the Cibola National Forest.
In just two days, the Dog Head Fire ballooned in size thanks to persistent hot, dry and windy conditions.
A blaze in central New Mexico exploded to almost 19 square miles and forced residents of some small communities to flee after sending up a towering plume of smoke that blanketed the state’s largest city in a thick haze.
Winds gusting to almost 40 miles per hour pushed the flames through canyons full of heavy brush, leading officials to order mandatory evacuations for Refugio Canyon, Venadito Canyon and Las Flores Canyon, which includes an ExxonMobil refinery, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office said.
Weather forecasters predicted record temperatures today and hot, dry and unstable weather into the weekend.
Fire information officers say infrared mapping overnight helped officials determine a more accurate picture of the area that has been burned by the blaze.
Fire information officer Denise Ottaviano said Thursday that several air tankers and helicopters are working the blaze in the Manzano Mountains, but there’s still zero containment.
On Wednesday afternoon, winds in the area were sustained between 15 and 25 mph with gusts up to 40 mph, Lam said., but west to southwest winds may gust up to 35 mph at times on Thursday, with sustained winds of 20 to 25 mph.
“This is a serious fire”, Martinez said later during a news conference and an Estancia school, where the command center for the firefighters is located.
A wildfire that has forced the evacuations of a string of small communities in central New Mexico has grown to almost 8 square miles. They couldn’t immediately say how many buildings were destroyed or whether any were homes because crews haven’t been able to access the area.
The Torrance County Sheriff’s Office ordered voluntary evacuations once the fire started to move.
A wildfire churning through coastal canyons west of Santa Barbara has ballooned to more than 6 square miles.
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Cause of the fire is under investigation. It’s probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 to 4 miles.
