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12,500 Acres and Counting: OJO FELIZ FIRE: Human-Caused Blaze Uncontained As Evacuations Continue

Posted on: Friday, 14 April 2006, 09:00 CDT

By Staci Matlock, The Santa Fe New Mexican

Apr. 14--OCATE, N.M. -- Stephanie Neifeld and Willy Groffman sat outside the Ocate Community Center on Thursday afternoon with other evacuees and watched the fire roil up west of them as smoke blocked the sun.

Just the night before, the two were treating friends to a Passover dinner in their Los Huerros home when law-enforcement officers told them they all needed to leave.

Wind had kicked up the Ojo Feliz Fire burning southeast of their house, and it was headed toward the Northern New Mexico village, about 30 miles north of Las Vegas, N.M.

The group finished dinner and then grabbed photo albums, books, their three dogs and the cat. "We just crammed stuff in the truck," Neifeld said. "We packed dog food, dog pans, dog beds. They'll be fine. But I couldn't find a nightgown last night."

By Thursday night, the winddriven blaze had burned more than 12,500 acres of steep, densely wooded hillsides and grass-filled valleys, and firefighters had yet to contain any part of the fire. State Forestry Division officials said the blaze was humancaused but had yet to determine exactly how it was ignited.

When first spotted Wednesday morning, it had only burned 25 acres and looked like 15 other small, short-lived fires that had burned in the same area in January.

"They thought they were going to get (Ojo Feliz) hooked," said John Harrison, a volunteer firefighter from Watrous and a fire spokesman for the State Forestry Division. "Then the wind shifted 180 degrees. It was just going everywhere."

Three times Wednesday night, ground crews had to pull back from the fire and let air tankers fight it from the skies with load after load of water.

As of Thursday night, 450 firefighters were battling the blaze. Four heavy air tankers, a lighter firefighting plane, three helicopters, four bulldozers and 20 engines were fighting the fire. Fire officials said the aircraft were hitting the northern and western edges of the fire with water while fire crews tried to protect homes and cut lines along the southern and eastern edges.

A mandatory evacuation remained in place for the villages of Los Huerros, Los Le Febres and Ojo Feliz. Officials closed access on N.M. 442 from La Cueva to Ocate on Thursday morning and N.M. 120 from Black Lake to Ocate on Thursday afternoon. Coyote Creek and Morphy Lake state parks also were closed late Thursday afternoon due to fire concerns.

Emergency shelters were open Thursday night at the Mora and Wagon Mound school gyms. Free camping was being provided at Sugarite Canyon, Cimmaron Canyon and Storrie Lake state parks.

Neifeld said their friends helped the couple grab their belongings and pack up vehicles. "Willy was very cool because he's been through this before," Neifeld said. "I was running around (panicked)."

This wasn't the first evacuation because of fire for Groffman or his friend Florentino Pacheco from nearby Los Le Febres. Two years ago, they evacuated as Cerro Pelon burned south of them. In 1996, Groffman had to evacuate himself and a bunch of his neighbors' children during a wildfire almost in the same area where Ojo Feliz burns now.

The couple spent Wednesday night with a friend in Ocate, Carl Bernstein. Others also stayed with friends, family, at the Ocate Community Center or in hotels.

But the fire kept moving closer to Ocate. State police went door to door along N.M. 120 Thursday afternoon urging people to leave. "A lot of people who went to stay with family or friends in Ocate now may have to move again," Bernstein said.

State police officer Ruth Woodard was putting up yellow crime scene tape at the driveways to homes along N.M. 120, where she had urged people to leave, although evacuations were voluntary. If they chose to stay, she took down their name and asked for their dentist's phone number. If people die in a fire, dental records are sometimes the only way to identify them, she said.

Billowing smoke from the fire was visible in a big loop from N.M. 518 to Mora and up the road to Black Lake. People sat in their vehicles or stood near their homes, watching as the fire shot deep, black or thick white clouds hundreds of feet into the air.

World War II veteran Modesto Borrego, 86, watched the fire from his ranch home near Guadalupita, west of the fire and safely behind a couple of ridges. Helicopters made water runs to a nearby pond belonging to one of his neighbors.

The massive smoke clouds popping up in several places at once reminded him of smoky battlefields in Europe, he said. In his younger days after the war, he fought wildfires in the valley for the U.S. Forest Service. "This is the biggest fire I've seen in this area," he said.

Leo Trujillo, a state highwaydepartment workman, looked red-eyed and tired Thursday afternoon after spending all night guarding the roadblock at Ocate. His wife and two daughters were at the nearby community center, helping prepare posole and red chile for the evacuees. "This fire is worse than the one at Cerro Pelon two years ago," he said.

His family had packed up a few belongings as police began voluntary evacuations along N.M. 120, just in case they couldn't go home.

His youngest daughter, Marina, 9, had packed in a small bag her lotion, shampoo, compact-disc player, batteries and a few books. "I packed my Easter dress, too," she said before holding her nose as smoke settled over the valley.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Santa Fe New Mexican

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Source: The Santa Fe New Mexican

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