When Colorado wildfires threatened this Western Slope town, neighbors showed up for each other

MEEKER — When a 60,000-acre wildfire is breathing down the neck of a small northwestern Colorado town, the locals don’t freeze. They follow their first instinct — to jump into action to protect themselves and their neighbors.

That’s how brothers David and Brian Smith found themselves standing at a crossroads about three miles west of Meeker just before lunchtime on Friday with two semitrailer-sized cattle haulers, along with a smaller livestock trailer and a couple of farmhands.

The Smith brothers, both ranchers, were waiting on a firefighter to escort them past a roadblock into the mandatory evacuation zone along Colorado 13. They showed up to help another rancher rescue hundreds of cattle stuck inside the perimeter of the Lee fire in Rio Blanco County.

Twin wildfires have scorched more than 110 square miles around Meeker since they were started by lightning on Aug. 2, with the Lee fire burning right up to the White River — just a mile away from the town’s southwestern border — while the smaller Elk fire burns 11 miles to the east. Thousands of people were under evacuation and pre-evacuation orders because of the fires until Friday afternoon, when sheriff’s officials downgraded most of the warnings.

As they waited on the road Friday, the Western Slope ranchers expected a tough chore ahead. It’s still too soon for cattle to come off their summer grazing land and the cows will know it, David Smith said. Even with heavy smoke in the air, the cattle will be determined to stay where the grass is green and where water is available.

“It’s too early and they don’t go where they don’t know to go,” he said.

The brothers expected to use anything they could — horses, four-wheelers and “any available man” — to round up the cattle and drive them to safety, David Smith said as ashen smoke billowed on the other side of a hill and wind whipped his shirttails.

Meeker residents have watched the Elk and Lee fires explode in size over the past week, fueled by high winds, humidity hovering in the single digits and hot weather. The Lee fire is now the largest wildfire burning in Colorado, and both fires caused Gov. Jared Polis to issue a disaster declaration and activate the Colorado National Guard. Two National Guard helicopters and crews arrived in Meeker on Friday to boost firefighting resources that are stretched thin by wildfires burning across the country.

Locals breathed a collective sigh of relief on Friday when fire officials eased some evacuation orders. While smoke still hung heavy in the air, the threat of the blaze reaching town lessened.

The Meeker Public Library reopened its doors Friday afternoon and put out poster boards and markers so people could create “thank you” posters for the firefighters in the town of 2,400.