COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Colorado Springs officials said Thursday that hundreds of homes have been destroyed by a raging wildfire that has encroached on the state’s second-largest city and threatened the U.S. Air Force Academy.
Mayor Steve Bach said a more accurate account would be available later in the day of the damage from a blaze that has burned out of control for much of the week and forced more than 30,000 evacuees to frantically pack up belongings and flee.
The cause of the blaze remains unknown and local authorities said Thursday that conditions were too dangerous for any such investigation to begin. El Paso County sheriff’s Lt. Jeff Kramer said that U.S. Forest Service agents were waiting for firefighting commanders to tell them when it’s safe to enter the burned area.
The wildfire was one of many burning across the parched West, blazes that have destroyed structures and prompted evacuations in Montana and Utah and forced the closure of a portion of Zion National Park.
Colorado’s Thursday weather forecast offered some hope for progress, with the temperature expected to reach into the mid-80s — about 5 degrees cooler than Wednesday — and humidity 15 to 20 percent, about 5 percentage points higher.
Winds were forecast to be 10 to 15 mph out of the west.