This is day 6 of RED FLAG warnings. Clouds over the fire area late yesterday helped to moderate some of the fire behavior in the late afternoon. This morning the size of the entire complex, including the West Fork, Windy Gap and Papoose fires is 75,150 acres.
Today members of the Colorado National Guard will be joining the fire fighting effort providing added security and staffing roadblocks.
West Zone West Fork Fire: The West Zone of the West Fork fire is the portion of the fire burning south of the continental divide. The segment on the south end of the fire that made a run up the backside of Sheep Mountain turned north yesterday, burning back towards the main body of the fire. There is still concern that burning in this area could move to the west posing a threat to Highway 160. Firefighters did a structure protection assessment in the Bruce Spruce Campground along West Fork Road yesterday and will be establishing a sprinkler system to protect the structures in that area today. Structure protection remains in place for Borns Lake.
Windy Pass Fire: The Windy Pass Fire made a run in the Lane Creek drainage, but it did not gain much in acreage since a good portion of the fire activity was within the existing fire perimeter. The fire went from 1,000 acres yesterday to 1,244 acres this morning. It did not cross over into the Wolf Creek Ski Area. Firefighters have been able to hold the Windy Pass Fire within the established indirect containment lines protecting the Wolf Creek Ski Area.
Evacuations: Pre-evacuation notices are in place for West Fork road and along East Fork road. For additional information on evacuations north of the continental divide call 719 569-4149
Closures: Again, there are multiple road and trail closures; the primary one in the West Zone is Highway 160 from just north of the chain-up area to South Fork. For additional information on road and trail closures affecting the San Juan National Forest go to:
http://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/sanjuan/alerts-notices
and for the Rio Grande National Forest:
http://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/riogrande/alerts-notices
For highway closures go to: http://www.cotrip.org/roadConditions.htm
West Fork Fire West Zone
Fire Information
970 731-2745
westforkfire@gmail
www.inciweb.org