Update: 136 homes burned in Boulder fire

Posted: Sep 8, 2010 6:13 PM by Andy Koen
Updated: Sep 8, 2010 6:31 PM

While helicopters and airplanes make dozens of air drops, Carole Speer watches and worries that her home in Boulder Heights could be lost.

"What's going through my mind right now is a combination of fear and anger."

Carole and her husband are among the hundreds of evacuees displaced by the fire. While grateful for the effort of fire fighters, she's heartbroken at the idea of losing her home and her normal life.

"I'm alive, my husband's alive. But I'm very scared, scared for all of the other people," she said.

Emergency managers downgraded the size of the Fourmile Fire Wednesday to 6,388 acres from an earlier estimate of 7,100. Four people are still unaccounted for and at least 136 homes have been destroyed by the flames.

In town, the YMCA has become a gathering place for evacuees and insurance adjusters. Dominique Leupi of the American Red Cross says the emergency shelter is providing evacuees with food, water, refreshments, and medical assistance.

She says relatively few people have needed to spend the night. Most are staying with friends and relatives. But she says, emotions are on edge for many people she's helped.

"I think, overall, people are just anxious and they just want information," Leupi said. "So, I think there's a bit of frustration that you can sense throughout everyone because they just want to know what's going on."

Thick cloud cover and cooler temperatures Wednesday afternoon helped firefighters to build a line along the eastern edge of the fire between Sunshine Canyon and Pine Brook Hills.

Laura McConnell, spokeswoman for the Rocky Mountain Incident Management Team says there fire is still not contained and that there is active fire in the area.

Air tankers on Wednesday dropped approximately 35,000 gallons of fire retardant helicopters dropped additional gallons water on the flames.

There's hope that some light rainfall Wednesday afternoon can help to further dampen the flames and give firefighters the upper hand on Thursday.