The fire follows tornadoes in Kentucky in mid-December. (File)
Better:
Three people are missing after a wildfire swept through several Colorado towns, quickly destroying nearly 1,000 homes as part of the latest in a series of U.S. natural disasters.
“We are very lucky that we do not have a list of 100 missing persons. But unfortunately we have three confirmed missing persons,” Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle told a news conference.
At least 991 homes were said to have been destroyed as the fires swept through the cities of Superior and Louisville, just outside the state’s largest city, Denver, on Thursday, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee without realizing it.
Shocking aerial footage showed entire streets as little more than piles of smoking ash, destruction that seemed almost total but somehow left a few houses strangely untouched.
Pelle said the search for the missing was hampered by the destruction and snow.
“The structures where these people would be are now completely destroyed and covered with about 20 centimeters of snow.”
Investigators have found no credible evidence to support previous reports that downed power lines could have started the fire, with Pelle claiming some residents had been confused by downed telecom lines.
However, investigators have “executed a search warrant at a specified location” as part of an ongoing investigation that Pelle described as “very active” and made up of federal and state partners.
The fire, which was fanned in a tinder-dry landscape, was fanned on Thursday by gusts of more than 160 kilometers per hour.
“This was a fast-moving disaster… over the course of half a day. Many families had minutes to get everything they could — their pets, their kids — in the car and leave,” said Governor Jared Polis, “just like in the blink of an eye.”
At least 33,000 people in Superior and Louisville had to flee, many with little more than the clothes on their backs.
Pelle said he spoke to the granddaughter of one of the missing on Saturday morning.
“They’re trying to find Grandma. And we’re trying to find Grandma for her,’ he said. “But the current circumstances don’t allow that to be done quickly.”
Although snowfall had helped put out the fire, it was “difficult for crime scenes, recovery efforts and damage assessments,” Pelle said.
The fire, which happened just before the New Year’s Eve holiday, follows tornadoes from mid-December in the state of Kentucky, which left dozens dead and thousands of families in crisis before Christmas.
While fires are a natural part of the climate cycle and help to remove dead brushes, their size and intensity increase.
Scientists say that a warming climate, mainly caused by human activities, such as the uncontrolled burning of fossil fuels, is changing weather patterns.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by DailyExpertNews staff and has been published from a syndicated feed.)
