Fire Experts Predict an Average Summer Season; Residents Told to Remain Vigilant
Trevor Phipps
Even though the 2025 wildfire season has not quite reached its prime and no burn bans have occurred, the Teller high country area has already gotten bombarded by a handful of blazes.
Luckily, though, no buildings or structures have been lost, and no residents from local subdivisions have been forced to evacuate due to a forest fire.
In fact, the few fires that have ignited locally were quickly attacked and contained by local firefighters. No recent blaze has spread to the point in which it was difficult to manage.
The first major fire that broke out this year occurred in an area of Teller County that experiences an average of five to 10 wildfires per year. The Turkey Tracks area is a shooting range, located in the Pike National Forest, that gets hit with so many forest fires that fire crews now dig a permanent fire break around the region to keep the blazes from spreading.
On April 12, the year’s first Turkey Tracks Fire was reported about eight miles north of Woodland Park at around 6 p.m. The fire was not close to any homes, but due to the hot, dry and windy conditions, the blaze spread quickly.
Two days later, fire crews announced that they had reached full containment for the blaze that scorched 128 acres. After the fire was contained, local news stations reported that a witness had seen someone start the fire by shooting “tracer rounds” (ammunition that leaves behind fiery “tracers”). And then, the suspects left the scene without reporting any traces of a fire, according to one news account. However, no one has been charged with any crime related to the blaze.
Fire Ignites Near Popular Hiking Trail
Then on May 14, an alert was sent out by the Teller County Sheriff’s Office stating that smoke was visible due to a fire near the Dome Rock trail, south of Florissant and Divide. According to the sheriff’s office, a wood chipper caught fire and ignited the blaze about 20 miles southeast of Florissant near the popular Dome Rock trail located in the Mueller State Park area.
While the blaze was still burning, the sheriff’s office put the nearby B Lazy M Ranch subdivision on pre-evacuation notice. However, the pre-evacuation notice was lifted at around 3 p.m. that same day after crews reached full containment of the blaze. It is still unknown exactly size of the fire. Moreover, no charges have yet to be filed related to the blaze.
Turkey Tracks Fire Spree Continues
Then during Memorial Day weekend, another blaze ignited in the infamous Turkey Tracks Shooting Range area. Just before noon on May 24, officials reported a fire in the Turkey Tracks area about 15 miles north of Woodland Park.
Luckily, right after the blaze ignited, the area received light precipitation that helped prevent the fire from spreading. The wildfire only grew about three acres before crews had it completely contained. Officials have not confirmed the cause of the fire and no injuries have been reported.
Despite a handful of local wildfires sparking up, the area hasn’t seen much overall fire activity. The only exception occurred for a few days when smoke could be seen from controlled burns in the region. Forest service crews have recently conducted controlled burns near Rampart and Crystal Reservoirs that have produced visible smoke in El Paso and Teller Counties. According to FrontlineWildfire.com, the fire labeled the Rainbow Gulch RX prescribed burn is about 260 acres in size.
A few other wildfires have also ignited across the state mainly in the west and southwest regions with none of them being rated as significant. On May 26, the Fault Line Fire, located seven miles west of Loma, on the Colorado-Utah border, had burned just more than 33 acres. At press time, containment was set at zero percent.
Experts Call for an “Average” Wildfire Season
To date, emergency response experts have mixed opinions on whether or not 2025 will be a bad season for forest fires or not. Many have said most of the state will experience an “average” wildfire season. That’s the good news. The bad news is that an average season still means that 6,000 fires will spark across the state and burn approximately 160,000 acres.
Some experts say that southern Colorado could have a higher risk than other parts of the state. According to the Predictive Services National Interagency Fire Center’s four-month outlook, June is supposed to be the worst month for wildfires, and southwestern Colorado is expected to be worse than other parts of the state.
After June, experts expect monsoon season to hit and bring more moisture to the state and lower the wildfire risk. “If we have a fairly robust one (monsoon season) like we are expecting this year, we start to see more regular showers and thunderstorms, and anytime we can get moisture into the soil into the fuels, obviously wet grass, wet trees don’t burn,” Nickolai Reimer, Wildland Fire Meteorologist with the Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center told KKTV 11 News.
