Nearly three weeks after the Alexander Mountain fire started west of Loveland, U.S. Forest Service officials have declared the wildfire to be 100% contained.
The fire, which started July 29 and is being investigated as human-caused, was completely contained Saturday, the Forest Service said on social media.
At the peak, 625 personnel were on scene fighting the fire, which destroyed 51 structures and burned 9,668 acres in Larimer County north of the Big Thompson Canyon. The U.S. Forest Service has been in command of the fire scene after the Southwest Incident Management Team 1 returned control Aug. 9 when the fire was at 91% containment.
The fire destroyed 26 homes and damaged at least four others, according to a report by the Larimer County Assessor’s Office. Twenty-one outbuildings were also destroyed.
Firefighters will continue to monitor the burn area, which is mostly on U.S. Forest Service land, as the Burned Area Emergency Response team continues to search for areas at risk of mudslides or flash flooding in the future.
“The Forest (Service) wants to recognize both the hard work as well as the stress and difficulty of the past three weeks,” acting Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests & Pawnee National Grassland Supervisor Jason Sieg said in a social post Saturday night. “There are members of the Cedar Park community who lost property and homes, and we will support them as best we can alongside our community partners and local agencies. We also want to thank the numerous agencies, partners, fire personnel and community members who stepped up to help in our joint coordination with Larimer County and Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control. This was a team effort.”
U.S. Forest Service wildland investigators are working with the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office to chase clues on who may have started the fire, even if it wasn’t intentional. They think the fire started between 10:30 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. July 29. Anyone with information about the start of the fire can call the Forest Service’s tip line at 303-275-5266.
Alexander Mountain is one of three Front Range wildfires being investigated as human-caused and ignited in the last week of July.
Arson investigators are still looking into the cause of the Quarry fire, which grew to nearly 580 acres in a highly-populated area of Jefferson County before firefighters got the perimeter fully under control Aug. 7. Federal investigators are also looking into the Stone Canyon fire that destroyed five structures and is linked to one death in Boulder County. It was fully contained Aug. 4 after burning 1,557 acres.