A wildfire that started as a structure fire in Sunshine Canyon before being spread by strong winds has forced evacuations in the Boulder County foothills that will remain in place overnight.
The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office posted on Twitter at 1:54 p.m. Monday that they were responding to a structure fire in the 2900 block of Sunshine Canyon Drive. That fire then spread to grassland and was quickly fueled by winds out of the west at 20 to 25 mph.
The evacuation area includes Pine Brook Hill after an update to the area at 7:20 p.m. Monday. The map of the evacuation area can be found at bouldercounty.maps.arcgis.com.
Initial evacuation orders earlier Monday included the area west of Foothills Community Park. Boulder County spokeswoman Jennifer Churchill said it is estimated there were 937 residents under mandatory evacuation at one point, and the area included 389 structures, 346 of which were homes.
County officials did not anticipate lifting any further evacuation orders Monday night.
UPDATE: #SunshineWildlandFire now at 20% containment. They do hope winds will die down overnight, but don’t expect #Boulder County mandatory evacuation orders to be lifted tonight. Evacuation area has been updated, however: https://t.co/yglMoqxtxP pic.twitter.com/lwrNmN1yFW
— Mitchell Byars (@mitchellbyars) December 20, 2022
By 5 p.m., the fire had grown to 16 acres and was being referred to as the Sunshine Wildland Fire. Initial estimates at 3 p.m. had the fire at about 18 acres, but updated mapping reduced that number.
By 7:20 p.m., crews had reached 25% containment on the fire and hoped that calmer winds overnight would help firefighting efforts.
Churchill said she did not have any information on if any structures other than the one in the initial call were damaged.
A separate set of crews were dealing with the original structure fire, but according to scanner traffic that fire had been contained to only one home and was under control.
Boulder open space rangers during the day were attempting to locate hikers in the area, and anyone recreating in the Mount Sanitas area was asked to evacuate the area. Anne U. White trail and Bald Mountain open space are also closed.
An evacuation area has been opened at the East Boulder Community Center, 5660 Sioux Drive, and will be open as a shelter overnight.
Evacuees can take large animals to the Boulder County Fairgrounds at 9595 Nelson Road in Longmont and smaller animals to the Humane Society of Boulder Valley at 2323 55th St. in Boulder.
There are no mandatory evacuation orders in the city of Boulder. Areas west of Ninth Street between Linden and University avenues were under an evacuation warning, but those residents were given the all clear just before 5 p.m.
Boulder Fire-Rescue tweeted that “limited fire spread and improving weather conditions” led to the decision to lift the evacuation warning, but asked residents to continue to monitor the situation.
Westbound traffic is closed at both Sunshine Canyon and Linden drives west of Boulder.