Yesterday evening I looked out into the backyard at what I thought was the weirdest, most orange sunset ever. I couldn't see the actual sun dipping behind the mountains. There are too many trees and close neighboring houses for that. But the light in the yard was just so strange. I went forward with what I was doing (cleaning the dog crate) and when I looked out next, it was full dark, and I thought no more about the light.
When I went to bed, with the whole house fan running, I could smell what I assumed was someone else's backyard fire pit, and I guessed that was how one of my neighbors was spending Labor Day weekend. This morning when I woke, I had a slight headache and the sky was hazy and the color of a fading bruise.
Turns out the Cameron Peak fire, the one burning in the mountains west of Fort Collins for three weeks, hit a growth spurt yesterday evening, possibly right around when I started noticing the light. It grew suddenly by about 10,000 acres when it found a pocket of abundant fuel. I've since heard that it might have been an area with a lot of beetle-killed pine trees, where it started invading Rocky Mountain National Park. I noticed the ash on the cars was partly composed of burned pine needles, for sure.
My girls and I went out to get the last of the supplies I wanted to have on hand before the puppy arrives. We went to two pet stores on the south side of town first, and then the Walmart on the north side later. The sky went from somewhat hazy when we started to Fires of Hell when we were done. It was raining ash so heavily it looked like it was snowing. (And yes, in 48 hours it will be snowing actual frozen precipitation, so we are getting all of the "Song of Ice and Fire" jokes thrown at us from social media.) When we left Walmart, we drove to one of the first rural roads past the edge of town, to see how bad it was. Even with the air conditioning on recirc in the car, the smell of smoke was strong, and the baby got very angry with us for not taking her straight home. It was only a five minute longer route home, but she had had enough!
When the fires were so bad a couple of weeks ago, everyone in town (read: the people on my Rotary Zoom meeting) talked about how it was making them feel bad, with headaches and breathing impairment. Back then, I literally felt no difference, and chalked it up to my chronic breathing issues making me used to not getting good oxygen. Today, even I notice a drop in my ability to breathe. This one is very close to home.
No comments:
Post a Comment