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CNN Sunday Morning

Raging Wildfires Push Toward Two Towns in Arizona

Aired June 23, 2002 - 10:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: In eastern Arizona, raging wildfires push unchecked toward two mountain towns, and townspeople are fleeing a 50-mile long wall of flames. A fire boss said the wildfire entirely blew up. CNN's Charles Molineaux is there watching the situation for us. Hello, Charles.

CHARLES MOLINEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles. Yeah, we're looking at the fire camp here in Show Low, Arizona, and it's a hot bed of activity, but that's about it because the rest of the town has turned into something of a ghost town.

Look at this plume of smoke. You can see it all along the east -- the western horizon. That is about what we have been seeing all morning. Last night, this was a wall of fire, moving toward Show Low, at the rate of about one mile every hour. Some 25,000 people were cleared out overnight. It could be as many as 30,000 people evacuated from this area and surrounding towns because of what is happening with the Chediski and Rodeo fires.

They did blow up yesterday, went through every containment line firefighters had tried to set up in front of them, and, basically, started moving toward this town. They moved through a canyon that was considered a strategic point. And at that point, they decided it was time to start clearing people out of the fire's way, and, at the moment, this entire area has been evacuated with the exception of this fire camp here, as fire crews still try to get a hold of it. Weather conditions have been extremely uncooperative.

Meanwhile, people have been scrambling to get their lives together, and get out of the fire's way. In some cases, dealing with the painful decision of just what is it they can bring.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Do you know what you're going to do?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My husband has cattle down here, and we have a garden, and it's watered. And all of our flowers are watered. And we'll be back.

QUESTION: Are you ready to move out?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, yes. Have to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MOLINEAUX: Now, for some people, this is actually a second evacuation. There are a few of the evacuees overnight who were in other towns in the area that were cleared out before and had to evacuate yet again, this past evening and into today. The -- several small towns in this area were actually overrun by fire over the course of the past 24 hours. Fire crews say they did have some luck in saving some structures. There's actually a good bit of pride attached to that. The expectation is that Show Low could very well see flames coming into the city over the course of the day, today and tomorrow.

Going to be a very big firefighting challenge for these crews. Of course, they are used to dealing with forest fire, but now they're going to be working with the local fire department in dealing with the houses on fire, as well. And that is expected to start as early as today.

Meanwhile, the governor is expected to arrive later this morning. And another type one incident management team, the third on this incident, is expected to be showing up today as well, to deal with what has turned into an enormous fire.

Miles, the expectation had been this one could go to 300,000 acres. We may be there already.

O'BRIEN: Charles, what about the fatigue factor? This has been a long road already, and a lot lies ahead.

MOLINEAUX: It has been, and fire crews are extremely vigilant about making sure that their people are on the job, but no more than, say, three hours, one hour rest. They're being -- maybe it's two to one, but they're being very careful about that, because that is something that they want to make sure happens, if the crews can be effective in the long haul. We actually will sometimes see crews around during the day because there are crews going around at night. They're certainly not working anything like 24 hours apiece. But there are crews working in shifts.

When the fire normally calms down at night -- this fire is actually extremely active. They have got a lot to do, and they're trying to take advantage of every hour they can. Fatigue is a major consideration and something that a lot of these people are very much working on, but they're putting in long days, nonetheless.

And one element of a great deal of pride, Miles, is that, with the exception of a couple of very minor cases of sunburn, they're dealing with no injuries among firefighters or the public from either of these two fires.

O'BRIEN: That's a good piece of news in all of this. Thank you, Charles Molineaux, in Show Low, Arizona.

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