#FireWeek: Is your family ready for the next big Colorado fire?
It’s a fear that we can all relate to — losing everything.
Over the past five years, devastating wildfires have ripped through our community, destroying homes and families.
“It’s my biggest fear,” said John Spengler. “On those Red Flag days, someone being irresponsible with a cigarette butt and starting a fire.”
Spengler has lived in the hills of North Cheyenne Cañon for the past 42 years. Highly flammable trees corner his lot, and some even touch his house.
“We think of the Waldo Canyon fire coming down into Mountain Shadows, and we have the same scenario here,” Spengler said.
He’s surrounded by miles of brush, trees and overgrowth at the base of Cheyenne Mountain.
“It’s everybody’s biggest fear around here, because there’s so much that can burn,” said Spengler’s neighbor, Steven McCutcheon.
While the threat of fire is everywhere after our dry winter, neighborhoods south of the Air Force Academy up to the Cheyenne Mountain Air Force station have extreme risk because of the homes’ close proximity to each other and heavy presence of brush and kindling.
“It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when, and hopefully you’re prepared,” McCutcheon said.
Ashley Whitworth with the Colorado Springs Wildfire Mitigation Team consults homeowners on how to be prepared and prevent fires from spreading to their homes.
“The first thing we look for is really the first 30 feet around their structure,” Whitworth said.
The immediate red flags are wood-shake roofs, highly flammable siding, and wood mulch around the house.
McCutcheon says he believes less than two percent of his neighborhood is fire ready. Many people living down the street from him have piles of brush on their lawns, firewood in the driveway, and even trees growing through their homes.
