By Amanda Lee Myers
The Associated Press
PHOENIX — Three Texans were charged Thursday with starting a fire than has charred more than 2,000 acres near Grand Canyon National Park.
The two men and a woman were camping Tuesday in the Kaibab National Forest when they left their campfire unattended after running out of water, according to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Flagstaff. High winds sent embers into the forest, quickly burning through more than 3 square miles of the forest.
The three are each charged with four federal misdemeanor charges, including leaving an unattended campfire and causing fire on federal land. A hearing date was set for June 30. They have not entered pleas to the charges.
The fire was 80 percent contained Thursday. Fire officials said crews were hoping to complete lines around the majority of the fire.
Meanwhile, a second straight day of fierce wind Thursday hampered firefighters battling a blaze in central New Mexico’s Manzano Mountains.
Fire officials estimated the acreage at 13,000, or about 20 square miles, by Thursday night. Peter D’Aquanni, a U.S. Forest Service public information officer, said crews tried to go in several times to get a count of what had been destroyed but were pushed back each time. Wind kept air drops of water and fire retardant grounded Thursday.
“We’re pretty much going to have a carbon copy of yesterday again today,” D’Aquanni said Thursday. Conditions are expected to be the same Friday, he said.
About 400 to 500 residents of the small communities of Torreon and Tajique and surrounding areas were asked to evacuate, D’Aquanni said. A shelter was set up at the community center in Estancia, but officials said some residents refused to leave their homes.
The fire was about 1 1/2 miles from Tajique late Thursday, fire information officer Keyco Lueras said. Both Torreon and Tajique were considered threatened, he said.
The human-caused fire began April 15 in the Cibola National Forest. Strong wind fanned the fire, sending it racing toward Manzano and Torreon before firefighters were able to catch it.
At least seven wildfires, two of which consumed more than 20,000 acres each, burned across Texas on Thursday, threatening homes, a wind farm and a $10 million vineyard, officials said.
A 21,000-acre blaze in western Texas neared a $280 million wind farm and an 800-acre vineyard, said Jeanne Eastham, a spokeswoman for the Texas Forest Service. The service had a mandatory evacuation for one ranch in the fire’s path.
A smaller blaze burned 2,000 acres in Midland County, destroying five buildings and threatening 200 more. It forced the evacuation of 150 homes, officials said.
In Southern California, a 784-acre wildfire burned near the San Bernardino National Forest near Mountain Center, about 100 miles southeast of Los Angeles.
The fire, which erupted Tuesday, was 25 percent contained Thursday evening, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Jim Behm said. More than 700 firefighters were attacking the blaze in the San Jacinto Wilderness 100 miles southeast of Los Angeles, but there were “major problems with steep, inaccessible terrain,” Behm said, and crews had to hike several miles to reach the fire.
No injuries were reported.
No evacuations were ordered but the wilderness and Mount San Jacinto State Park were closed, along with the Pacific Crest Trail and several other hiking trails.
The nearest homes were about two miles away in Palm Springs.
The fire was possibly caused by a cigarette but remained under investigation, Behm said.