Stand By

Our local weather sucks:

Colorado’s so-called Waldo Canyon fire sent a mushroom cloud of smoke nearly 20,000 feet (6,100 metres) into the air over Colorado Springs near Pikes Peak, whose breathtaking vistas from the summit helped inspire the song “America the Beautiful”.

Closer to the blaze, which has been fanned by winds blowing into the Southern Rockies from the prairies to the east, trees were visibly twisting from the heat of the flames.

The latest evacuations brought the total number of people forced from their homes to about 12,000 as the blaze posed a renewed threat to hundreds of dwellings and appeared to have roared to within about a mile (1.6 km) of the U.S. Air Force Academy grounds in Colorado Springs.

The USAFA isn’t that far south of here. It’s on the opposite side of I-25, which should serve as a decent firebreak.

We’re signed up for all the reverse-911 and text alerts and all the rest. I have the family photo archives and whatnot on external drives I can grab in a hurry. We’ve already made arrangements for the dog and the cat, just in case.

It’s not panic-time here. But it is time to take sensible precautions, which is exactly what we’re doing. If we do have to pack up an go, follow my Twitter feed for more fire updates.

UPDATE: Please allow me to apologize in advance for the language I’m about to use.

Fuck you, Reuters.

The fire started it Waldo Canyon. It’s a wildfire. So there’s not one damn thing “so-called” about the Waldo Canyon Fire. That’s just exactly what the hell it is, capiche?

We don’t need any clever “one man’s wildfire is another man’s chance to make s’mores” formulations tonight. The place I love, the place I’ve called home for almost 20 years — it’s on fire.

So bite me, Reuters.