Elmer's Twomile Blog

Firstly, I’d have taken a photo of the scene at the donation site, but in the chaos of this week, I’ve misplaced my camera.

But let me say this:

I’ve had a box of clothes sitting here, waiting to be donated somewhere for about six months. It was very easy to be motivated to throw it in the car and mosey down to 3111 28th St. — between Time Warp Comics and Thunderbird Burgers in Tebo Plaza, and they’re open 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. for the foreseeable future — to donate it. It was very easy to get the donation receipt.

But it wasn’t all that easy to leave. It’s a small thing I did. I carried a box of clothes that I was ready to part with long ago down to a strip mall about a three-minute drive (in traffic) from my home. But there was a line of cars. The traffic was caused by people wanting to donate clothes to people who’ve been evacuated — some who already know that there’s nothing to go home to. The Civil Air Patrol directed traffic and helped unload cars efficiently, so most people didn’t get out of their cars at all.

I had parked back by Blockbuster, seeing the traffic, figuring I’d just walk the box in.

Inside was a vacant unit, set up just for this cause. Row after row of folding tables were piled with garbage bags and cardboard boxes full of clothes, which volunteers sorted and folded.

Two men in Civil Air Patrol uniforms breezed past me with grocery carts full of bags to be added to the operation.

“It’s like thrift shopping in reverse,” one said.

And it’s true — that’s exactly how it looked. It looked like they were setting up a very large thrift store for the very first time.

After I got my receipt, a woman stepped up to the volunteer sign-in table next to me. She had just dropped off some clothes. She said that as long as she was here, she figured she could help sort some clothes.

I was just so impressed by the efficiency and the quantity of goodwill in front of my eyes, I got kind of worked up. I could have watched it all day, if I didn’t have a laundry list of things to do to prepare for some travel and the possibility of a one-day weekend.

At first, I thought it was a huge cloud. This was probably half an hour after the fire started. The wind carried the plume of smoke in such a way that it drew a straight line to 28th St. and Iris Ave.

Photo taken from Villa Shopping Center parking lot.

Photos of ash on the doormat didn’t turn out too well, but it doesn’t matter — there are photos that tell the story far more compellingly now.

Tonight, there’s a benefit just outside of what we’d call “our neighborhood,” but it still has some Condo City flavor: The Whiskey Bottles will play some tunes, Comida and Streat Chefs will sell some food and Common Threads and other businesses will collect donations for Fourmile Canyon Fire relief at Common Threads.

The orange glow over the mountains has faded substantially since we saw it at dusk, but reports say it could take several days to put out the Fourmile Canyon fires. We have a little ash on our doormat. My eyes aren’t bothering me anymore, though, and for that I gather I can thank the bombers we saw flying overhead this evening. From the Camera:

By 7:20 p.m., the winds let up enough to get more aircraft in the skies, officials said. Three air tankers were operating over the wildfire with the assistance of two other planes.

The tankers — one single-engine tanker with a 799-gallon capacity and two heavy tankers each with 2,300-gallon capacity — were dropping retardant and returning to Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport to refill, officials said. The turnaround time was 20 minutes.

The tankers were expected to operate until it was too dark to do so. Four additional heavy tankers from Boise, Idaho, were expected to arrive Monday evening and assemble at the Broomfield airport until Tuesday morning.

I’m feeling helpless and generally terrible for the folks who have lost their homes over there. In a futile effort to feel useful, I’ve now added a page on government to this site, featuring the various elected officials who represent us here. October 4 is the deadline to register for this year’s general election.

Needless to say, it’s bad out there — close your windows, keep your air recycled and get a mask if you have to go outside. The light turned orange about 11:30 this morning and that’s when the ash started falling. The smoke was going directly over Iris and 28th today early on, and now it has widened to become a giant cloud over the city.

Drink a lot of water today, folks.

Follow the developing Fourmile Canyon fire story at the Camera.

Send in your smoke photos of you’ve got ‘em. I’ll post some when I’m not so busy. Here’s one from a Camera reader, taken from Nederland.