A massive and growing wildfire, one of many burning in the Texas Panhandle, has now become the largest in state history, scorching more than a million acres, devastating cattle ranches, Homes have been destroyed and it’s getting out of control.
This sparsely populated region is home to most of the state’s cattle – millions of cows and calves, oxen and bulls – spread out across farms whose size and lack of roads make it difficult for people to get through and easy to cause fires. It happens.
Wildfires are nothing new to Panhandle ranchers, many of whom know how to convert their pickups into makeshift fire trucks to fight blazes that break out from time to time.
But no one had ever seen a fire like the one named Smokehouse Creek. It caught fire on Monday and was still burning uncontrolled as of Thursday. There have been two deaths so far due to the fire.
Cattle farmers have been forced to watch as the grasslands on which their cattle depend for food have been transformed into black fields. Sid Miller, the state agriculture commissioner, said thousands of cattle may already be dead or so injured in the fire that they will have to be slaughtered.
Even those whose cattle survived are struggling to find a place to eat for their herds. Mr Miller said a cattleman he knew had 1,500 head of cattle, but “there was no grass and no water” and was in a desperate state.
“He is looking for a place to move his cattle,” he said, adding that trucks are being used to transport them. “He has to go out of state, to Kansas or Nebraska or Wyoming.”
The economic loss of wildfire is not yet clear. Mr. Miller said about 85 percent of the approximately 12 million cattle in Texas are in the Panhandle, but most of them are concentrated in feedlots and dairy farms. Those operations were largely unaffected by the fire, he said.
The cattlemen most affected were those who owned extensive properties, where cattle roamed across thousands of acres of land.
“Just my prediction, but 10,000 people will die or we’ll have to euthanize,” Mr. Miller said. “It’s sad. A lot of those cattle are still alive but their hooves are burnt, their udders are burnt. It’s just a sad, sad situation.”
One such cattleman, Jeff Chisum, said he was still assessing how many of his 600 cows were lost. They found the remains of some and some had to be put down.
“It’s hard to see,” said Mr. Chisum, whose farm is north of the town of Pampa and was directly in the path of the largest fire. His entire farm of about 30,000 acres was burnt.
On Facebook, his wife, Leigh Chisum, said he was “carried away by baby calves standing alone in black, desolate pastures with dead cows scattered across the streets.” He added, “So many people have lost so much.”
In addition to cattlemen, residents of towns like Fritch and Canadian dot the landscape, small communities oriented around the land and local churches, lost homes and almost everything else.
Joyce Blankenship, an 83-year-old woman who lived on the outskirts of the town of Stinnett, died in her home Tuesday after the fast-moving flames engulfed her home.
As soon as one of her sons, Paul Blankenship, learned via Facebook that the fire had “spread across the highway” and began to engulf the area around his home, he immediately tried to get to her. But the roads were already closed. There was a lot of fire.
“She was a good mother and fed us,” said Mr. Blankenship, 65, whose family has lived in the area since 1958. “She loved us.”
The second woman, Cindy Owen, 44, was burned to death when her company truck burst into flames Tuesday as she was driving home from Oklahoma to Amarillo, her sister said.
Sister Melissa Owen said, “The fires came very close to her, they were coming fast and she jumped out of her truck because she was afraid the fire was going to burst on top of her.” “When she came out, the fire caught her and she was scorched from head to toe.”
Ms Owen said her sister was at work when the fire occurred. “What I understand is that the company knew and yet they sent him out on the street,” Ms. Owen said. His sister was taken to a hospital in Oklahoma and died early Thursday, he said.
At a church in Fritch that serves as a shelter, 7-year-old Emryn Nixon sat hugging her teddy bear with her father, mother and her three younger siblings. His house was destroyed by the flames.
His mother, Ellie Matthews, 23, said the only thing she could identify in the smoldering remains of the home that had been in her husband’s family for nearly half a century was a metal sign belonging to Emerin. The 7-year-old girl said her grandmother “fell to her knees” when she noticed someone was missing from the house.
“I feel very sad for my grandfather because all his memories were in that house,” he said.
Despite light rain and snow in some areas Thursday, the Smokehouse Creek fire is only 3 percent contained, according to the Texas A&M Forest Service. The fire has so far burned at least 1,075,000 acres of land – more than five times the size of New York City – and has grown beyond the size of the state’s previous largest wildfire in 2006.
The cause of the fire was not immediately known, but on Thursday Xcel Energy, a utility company, said in a regulatory filing that it had received a letter from a law firm on behalf of property insurers warning it that it could face losses in connection with the fire. Will face potential liability for. with fire.
Firefighters deployed from across the state were working with limited time to bring the wildfire under control before strong winds and hot, dry air were expected to return to the region over the weekend.
Forecasters said firefighters could be helped by weaker winds and cooler temperatures Thursday, which are expected to be between 30 and 40. But Edward Andrade, chief forecaster at the National Weather Service office in Amarillo, said the light rain probably wouldn’t be enough to put out the fire.
Gusty winds of about 30 mph were expected to return Saturday, and temperatures were forecast to rise into the 70s. Mr Andrade said these conditions were likely to continue on Sunday, and could accelerate the spread of the fire and hinder firefighting efforts.
The rugged terrain of the Canadian River Valley, where the fire broke out, was another major obstacle for firefighters, as fire engines cannot navigate some of the rocks, ravines and steep hills in the area.
The Smokehouse Creek fire, combined with other nearby fires, spread across at least 11 counties early Thursday and into Oklahoma.
Mr Blankenship, whose mother died in the fire, said the last time he saw a fire in his area was about 20 years ago. During that fire, he said, he was able to drive to his mother’s house to pick her up — and barely made it there after struggling to find her way to her house.
“The smoke was so bad that I didn’t realize the turn off and almost immediately the fire crossed the highway and almost engulfed my jeep,” he said. “But I managed to get there and rescue my mother before everything burned down.”
He tried to do the same on Tuesday also. but could not.
john yoon And evan penn Contributed to the reporting.
