The fires in Texas offer a terrifying warning
The Smokehouse Creek fires in Stinnett, Texas, are still coming – but what can we do about it? A spokesman for the Texas Agriculture Commission
“When you look at the damages that have occurred here it’s just gone, completely gone nothing left but ashes on the ground,” Abbott said during a news conference in Borger, Texas. He said a preliminary assessment found 400 to 500 structures had been destroyed.
Texas officials warned that the threat was not yet over. Higher temperatures and stronger winds forecast for Saturday elevated worries that fires in the Panhandle could spread beyond the more than 1,700 square miles (4,400 square kilometers) already chewed up this week by fast-moving flames.
The Smokehouse Creek fire has also crossed into Oklahoma, and the Texas A&M Forest Service said Friday that it has merged with another fire. Friday’s figure was 15% contained, up from 3% on Thursday.
The National Weather Service is warning that strong winds, low humidity and dry conditions will pose a serious wildfire threat.
“We face huge potential fire dangers as we head into this weekend,” Abbott said. “No one can let down their guard. Everyone must remain very vigilant.”
There are about 1,600 people in the town of Stinnett, and many of them were forced to flee due to the Smokehouse Creek fire. The homes were reduced to piles of rubble. An American flag propped up outside a destroyed house.
Texas agriculture commissioner Sid Miller said individual ranchers could suffer huge losses from the fires, but he was optimistic that the impact on the state’s cattle and beef industry would be minimal.
Multiple fatalities and destruction of structures in the Texas wildfires that stopped on the edge of a Stinnett man’s house in Hemphill County
Two women were confirmed killed by the fires this week. But with flames still menacing a wide area, authorities haven’t yet thoroughly searched for victims or tallied homes and other structures damaged or destroyed.
Cindy Owen was driving in Texas’ Hemphill County south of Canadian on Tuesday afternoon when she encountered fire or smoke, said Sgt. Chris Ray is an employee of the Department of Public Safety. She got out of her truck, and the fire overtook her.
Joyce Blankenship was the other victim and she was a former substitute teacher. Her grandson, Lee Quesada, said deputies told his uncle Wednesday that they had found Blankenship’s remains in her burned home.
President Joe Biden, who was in Texas on Thursday to visit the U.S.-Mexico border, said he directed federal officials to do “everything possible” to assist fire-affected communities, including sending firefighters and equipment. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has guaranteed Texas and Oklahoma will be reimbursed for their emergency costs, the president said.
The biggest challenges for the firefighters are the weekend forecast and the larger than average amount of fire.
Kidd wanted the community to not feel that the fires would not grow anymore. “This is still a very dynamic situation.”
Jeremiah Kaslon, a Stinnett resident who saw neighbors’ homes destroyed by flames that stopped just on the edge of his property, seemed prepared for what the changing forecast might bring.
“We get all four seasons in a week around here,” Kaslon said. “It can be hot, hot and windy, and it will be snowing the next day. It’s just that time of year.”
Source: Gov. Abbott says Texas wildfires may have destroyed up to 500 structures
The Smokehouse Fire: How far is Seattle from the Ohio River? Two weeks before the fire broke out in Fritch, Washington, the town that lost a hundred thousand homes
Encroaching flames caused the main facility that disassembles America’s nuclear arsenal to pause operations Tuesday night, but it was open for normal work by Wednesday. The small town of Fritch, which lost hundreds of homes in a 2014 fire, saw 40 to 50 more destroyed this week, Mayor Tom Ray said.
Two weeks before the Smokehouse Fire broke out, I flew to Seattle from Cincinnati over a landscape I know well. But some 30,000 feet below my window seat lay a country I barely recognized: From the Ohio River to the Rockies, there was virtually no snow; the lakes and rivers were ice free. I am a northerner and I know that February is supposed to look like, but what season was this?
Several wildfires in Texas, US have killed at least 15 people and destroyed thousands of homes. The Smokehouse Creek fire has also crossed into Oklahoma. Texas Governor Greg Abbott said that individual ranchers could suffer huge losses from the fires, but he was optimistic that the impact on the state’s cattle and beef industry would be minimal.