Case Study: The Awful Marshall Fire of Colorado

The recent raging fires around LA that have captured so much attention (and for good reason) jogged my memory of another awful fire that has parallels. I'm referring to one of Colorado's worst fires, which eventually got named the "Marshall Fire." This fire can serve as a case study that should be popularized. It can better inform public policy and be an educational warning for the general public. It also has less of the politically charged rhetoric that surrounds the current southern California situation. However, it is not devoid of a key political angle—that I will cover at the end. But let's first review what the Marshall fire was and the circumstances around it.

The Colorado Flash Fire of December 30, 2021

Authorities determined that the fire originated in the vicinity of Marshall, CO, hence the name. The town is located between the larger urban areas of Denver and the People's Republic of Boulder along Highway 36, which connects the two cities. In the past, oh, maybe 30 years, the greater Denver region has seen massive growth; the character of Colorado changing in the process. Population growth started filling along the towns of Highway 36, but there was still a lot of that tall prairie grass that seemed to flourish on the high plains. The general area is where the great plains run into the Rocky Mountains, a geography that can result in interesting weather, including hellacious winds. Colder, denser air from the mountains can push down through the front range and then into the highly populated area. Marshall may have named the fire, but it affected other towns in the area, ones which included members of my own family.

There is a false belief that fires don't occur during the winter. The events of December 30, 2021, certainly debunk this belief. Review the basic fire triangle like you did in grade school: Fuel-Oxygen-Heat. Sure, there's less heat in winter, but it's easier to make up for that one versus the other two. Dryness plays a big role. The West tends to get it in bigger extremes than the East. When you get dried-up prairie grass, it can go up like a box of matches when ignited. And when it does go up in flames, you may not be able to run fast enough to escape it given the Chinook-strength winds— they were about 90 mph when the fire caught.

Within a day or so nearly a thousand buildings were burned (some totally incinerated, nothing left), multiple dead, and ~37,500 evacuated. It would've been worse had there been more to burn in the immediate vicinity. The larger urban areas of Denver and Boulder were spared due to circumstances. In all about $2 billion in damages was reported.

My family members were lucky. The fire stopped before their houses were burned. There's a phrase in places with fickle weather: "Don't like the weather? Wait 30 minutes, it will change." Well, on the eve of a new year, the weather changed. Snow started coming down with the ash. The significant moisture fall gave a big assist to the authorities fighting the fire. It seemed Mother Nature gave a reprieve. The new year would be spent taking an account of the damages and the inevitable questions of how this could've happened. What could be learned?

Post Fire Fallout

People were not only shocked at how severe the fire was but also by how fast it spread. Local firefighting was overwhelmed. Infrastructure deficiencies were also discovered. The fire was actually able to derail or handicap responders. For example, power was compromised, which reportedly led to reduced capabilities. Pumping water was among them. As it turned out, some infrastructure issues and the local government's pre-planning were not sufficient to meet the challenge of such a ferocious fire. They were simply overwhelmed. Dumb luck mitigated things from being even worse.

I don't think there's a full account of the fire and its aftermath in any one linked article, but here is a link from a local news outlet that I tend to put more stock in. The Denver Gazette also ran a piece here. There is also the very important topic of who pays for it. Well, after the accounting of persons and property comes the insurance claims, liability, etc. Here's a link to a left-leaning piece that helps describe it. FEMA also later stepped in to help with claims and costs. The Biden admin took emergency action to release funds.

Who's to blame? Ah, that's the question that most want to get at. Not necessarily what reforms can be done to improve things moving forward or an after-action review, but "who's to blame?" The official Boulder County report gave an answer here. Officially, there was no crime or personal negligence, but nonetheless, a lotta suing was to come. Two fire sources were cited: (1) Dirt-covered embers on a residential property left days before; (2) A Xcel Energy utility power line. (Xcel Energy disputed the claim, but I think they got buried in lawsuits. Money to be had.) Investigators say the +90 mph winds dislodged a power line that then arced with other power lines, causing a secondary fire. So, officially, it was said that Xcel was the second fire, not the first. The authorities also said the alleged residential fire remained from days before, but did not warrant charges. I would also highlight that this singled-out private fire was reported as being used for a Christian group. Perhaps an easy minority to blame in Boulder County.

So does the fire cause investigation end here? Does the Boulder County report cover all issues and that's a wrap? Or is there a "Rest of the Story," as Paul Harvey used to say? Maybe.

The Rest of the Story - an inconvenient one

Homelessness and transients have increased sharply in the Boulder-Denver area in recent years. In the winter of 2021, there was less of a rampant homeless and public sanitation issue compared to today, but there were still quite a few alternative living transient types. You may not be totally familiar with this type of person if you have not had exposure to living in the western states of America. There is a certain type of free-living, frequently hippie-like folks who will travel in vans or vehicles pursuing whatever happens to be the thing that moves them at that moment. This is a general type of person I am familiar with from my time out west. Some can just be young people seeking adventure during a stage in life; others can be burned-out types with no further prospects in life than just getting by. It can be a mixed bag of people. But in the area of the fire origin, there was a documented group of transients living, perhaps squatting. Outsiders to the community that may have not been familiar with Colorado, the local high wind climate, and sound fire safety practices.

I happened to be visiting family in Colorado about five weeks prior to the fire. For some unexplainable reason, I felt this compulsion that told me to go see them. I ignored it at first, but somehow the urge nagged at me. Something told me that if I didn't go visit them now—as in the near future—then I would never see them again. (Weird. I know it sounds a bit crazy. I would call it a Premonition. I have no further explanation. It's not even rational.) So this Premonition of mine sent me out to Colorado for a visit. Everything went well, and I very much enjoyed it. I spent time in the vicinity of the fire and had the opportunity to go to my cousin's mountain house in the Breckenridge area back in the mountains. It was a bit surreal to see the images of a raging fire in a familiar area on the news a short time later.

From my relative I learned that a local "native" Coloradan, as they like to say, got miffed with this transient group living perhaps illegally in the area. One of the points of concern was the transients were burning trash outside. I do not know the details of how much or whether it was reported to the local authorities. My guess is that it was because this person got a bit engaged with the issue. The local Coloradan, I'm told, did take pictures to document the transients and the fires to have evidence. One of my relatives said multiple neighbors in the area saw it and were aware of the issue. I have yet to see this mentioned in any Boulder County authority report or in the major local papers of Denver. Open burning of trash in high winds certainly is not a good idea on the high plains, regardless.

So, did a small group of hippie types living in a run-down community doing open trash burns actually start the Marshall Fires? Hard to say with absolute certainty. There are disgusted local Coloradans who believe that's the probable root cause, though. If that were the case, then what would it mean?

Political Shifts toward Sanctuary from Norms

Even going back to the 1960s, the Bolder area was open to people of alternative lifestyles. But there's been an evolution of it since the 60s for the worse. Instead of being this earthy, free-living, good-vibes feeling, outdoorsy nature-people types, this transient population has gone in a bitter direction. It's shifted from a camping, "dirt bagging it" sensibility to a disordered homelessness anarchy. People who just disregard standards and norms and don't care. Even fire safety norms went out the window. It went from liberal to angry Leftist. Some of the most disagreeable people I've run into are in Boulder, CO. There's more to say on that, but that's not the topic here.

The angle is this: did Boulder County authorities and the general press put blinders on their investigation into the root cause of the Marshall Fire? Are there certain inconvenient truths that should not be highlighted? Things that a progressive mind might think are better covered up because they might interfere with progressive politics? Such as being a sanctuary for new experiments in policies that frequently disregard old norms. If transient hippie types were suspected of causing the Marshall fires, then it would call into question the Boulder-Denver area's political shift going further Left. It means we might have to clean up our towns and cities and have public order with a mind toward civics.

So now I think of the even bigger fires in Southern California. When the official reports are finally written and released, will there be any key pieces of pertinent information left out or censored? C'mon man.