Elmer's Twomile Blog

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.