Update: This story was published Tuesday. Read Wednesday’s wildfire updates here.

Soaring temperatures and tinder-dry conditions allowed the Alexander Mountain fire to race across 5,080 acres of national forest near Loveland on Tuesday as a new wildfire sparked just 8 miles south in Lyons, forcing further evacuations and possibly destroying two structures.

The Stone Canyon fire was reported at 1:30 p.m. north of Lyons and grew to an estimated 450 acres by Tuesday night.

Mandatory evacuation orders went out in less than an hour and quickly expanded into Larimer County, and shifting winds forced evacuations in the town of Lyons later Tuesday afternoon.

Rough boundaries of the mandatory evacuation zone included Cattle Drive Road in Larimer County to the north; Rabbit Mountain and Carter Lake Reservoir to the east; U.S. 36 in Lyons to the south; and Elk Ridge and the end of Hell Canyon Road to the west. Current evacuation maps are available online at boulderodm.gov.

County officials received unconfirmed reports of two structures destroyed in the fire but could not yet say where those buildings are located.

“The conditions are about as bad as they can be to fight this fire,” Boulder County Sheriff Curtis Johnson said in a briefing Tuesday afternoon. “I expect it will take days for us to be able to really manage it.”

Roughly 70 firefighters and multiple aircraft are focused on slowing the fire down, protecting structures and making sure people are safe, Johnson said.

Firefighting airplanes and helicopters were able to respond so quickly to the Stone Mountain fire because it’s just 8 miles south of the Alexander Mountain fire, Johnson said.

Fire officials are hopeful the wildfires will not connect but are sharing information and resources, he said.

The Alexander Mountain fire grew rapidly overnight and throughout the day Tuesday because of extremely dry fuels and weather conditions, U.S. Forest Service Incident Commander Mike Smith said at a briefing Tuesday afternoon.

Fire officials do not yet have a map of the wildfire’s footprint because of how quickly it’s changing, Smith said. There was no containment as of Tuesday afternoon.

“We hope to see that improve but that will really depend on Mother Nature giving us a break,” Smith said.

Weather forecasts for the rest of the week are not in firefighters’ favor, Smith and Johnson said. National Weather Service forecasts show temperatures reaching the mid- to high 90s through Friday, when there’s a 30% chance of thunderstorms.

Fire officials expanded the mandatory evacuation zone Tuesday, and rough boundaries now include Storm Mountain to the north, Devil’s Backbone Open Space to the east, Indian Mountain to the south and Crosier Mountain to the west. Current evacuation maps are available online at nocoalert.org.

County officials have sent out mandatory evacuation notices to more than 3,200 contacts and an additional 800 voluntary evacuation warnings. Contacts do not equal the number of people evacuated because households often have multiple contacts on file with the county’s emergency alert system, according to the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office.

There were 270 firefighters attacking the Alexander Mountain fire from the ground and 17 aircraft coordinating fire crews and dropping water and retardant. They include a “super scooper” airplane that draws up water without stopping and can dump a lot of water onto a fire very quickly, according to Smith.

Fire crews saw the blaze grow to the west, north and east in the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests, and shifting winds late Tuesday began pushing the fire farther north.

The fire has not yet jumped U.S. 34 to the south and officials hope rocky terrain will slow down the fire’s growth, Smith said in an earlier briefing.

Response teams on both fires are dealing with a national shortage of firefighting resources caused by the large number of wildfires burning across the United States, according to Smith and Johnson.

The Alexander Mountain fire will be escalated to a complex incident management team Wednesday, which “brings a lot more resources to bear,” Smith said at the Tuesday afternoon briefing.

Fire officials are hoping to have hot shot crews deployed because of their expertise in challenging terrain and technical assignments, he said.

No structures have been confirmed as damaged or destroyed in the Alexander Mountain fire, and no injuries have been reported in either fire.

The causes of both fires are under investigation.

Wildfire smoke will have wide impacts across the Front Range as state public health officials issued air quality alerts through Wednesday because of the wildfires and ozone levels. Ozone levels forecast to reach unhealthy levels in the Denver-Boulder area on Wednesday, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

Colorado officials took additional action with Gov. Jared Polis declaring disaster emergencies for both fires Tuesday, which activates a state emergency operations plan and directs state officials to “take all necessary and appropriate actions to assist with response, recovery and mitigation efforts” in the fires, according to a news release.

Polis also declared a disaster emergency for the Currant Creek fire burning in Delta County.

Denver Post reporter Lauren Penington contributed to this report.

Originally Published: July 30, 2024 at 8:46 p.m.