Boulder Fourmile Canyon fire damage estimate rises: 169 residences, 3 other structures burned

​At 7:56 a.m., we published an update about the Fourmile Canyon fire near Boulder in which a public-information officer estimated that 140 structures had burned, with no guess as to how many were homes. But the story's changing quickly. Spokesperson Lynn Barclay says the number of destroyed structures is now placed at 172, with 169 of them identified as residences.

In addition, Barclay says, another 25 structures have been damaged.

The rest of the information provided in the post linked above remains current. Check it out below:

"We aren't issuing a containment percentage at this point," says Greg Huele, public-information-officer trainee for the Fairmount Fire Protection District. "We've got close to twenty miles of fire line around the fire, with about three miles of completed line -- and we built line yesterday and all through the night. But it's not considered containment just because the line is there. We need to secure that, and make sure it stays secure, before we can call sections contained."

The latest map of the Fourmile Canyon fire perimeter.

​At this writing, the Boulder Office of Emergency Management web page hasn't posted specific addresses for the structures said to have been destroyed. Indeed, the only addresses listed are for the first 54 structures confirmed burned in recent days -- just over half of the 92 said to have been lost as of yesterday.

According to Huele, the latest numbers "can still change, depending on conditions."

Indeed, the weather doesn't look good for the massive crew now involved in fighting the blaze: 550 firefighters from at least 35 different agencies, with assistance from an air armada consisting of five heavy air tankers, four fixed-wing aircraft and five helicopters.