Officials: Fuelbreaks 'Without A Doubt' Save Homes In Grand Lake Golf Course Fire

GRAND LAKE, Colo. (CBS4)- No homes were lost in last week's Grand Lake Golf Course fire and state Forest Service officials say it was because of fuelbreaks.

Last Thursday, 300 homes were ordered to evacuate due to the 20-acre wildfire burning at the Grand Lake Golf Course in Grand Lake.

The fire came within 30 feet of some homes but no homes burned.

"The forestry work and fuels mitigation the Colorado State Forest Service has administered in the Grand Lake community without a doubt saved the Columbine subdivision," said Chief Mike Long, Grand Lake Fire.

Since 2015, the Colorado State Forest Service along with others have completed more than 215 acres of targeted fuels "treatments" near subdivisions impacted by the fire. The treatments include removing beetle-kill trees and the creation of fuelbreaks to reduce wildfire risk.

According to the Colorado State Forest Service: The Golf Course Fire is not the only example of recent fuels mitigation work helping to save Colorado communities from 2018 wildfires. Forest management work near Silverthorne, largely to create a fuelbreak around subdivisions, was attributed by fire managers as a major reason homes did not burn last month during the Buffalo Mountain Fire. Firefighters were able to stop that fire – before it nearly burned into many of the 1,400 evacuated homes – within a fuelbreak that provided a safe and effective location for firefighters to stop its progress. Without the proactive fuels mitigation work, fire managers said, homes there likely would have been lost.

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