This is a list of Colorado wildfires which have occurred periodically throughout its

recorded history Recorded history or written history describes the historical events that have been recorded in a written form or other documented communication which are subsequently evaluated by historians using the historical method. For broader world hist ...

Colorado State Forest Service The Colorado State Forest Service (CSFS) is the forest service agency for the U.S. state of Colorado. It is modeled after the United States Forest Service. Their goal is "providing timely, relevant forestry information and education to Colorado cit ...

Wildfire Policy in Transition: Where There's Smoke, There's Mirrors.
One of the most significant fires in United States history was The Big Blowup of 1910.

History of Significant Fires on State And Private Lands (acreage and/or home loss and/or fatalities).
In that fire, 3 million acres burned and 78 firefighters were killed in the northern

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico in ...

(in the states of

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyom ...

, and

Montana Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...

) which led to a standing policy in Colorado of all fires out by 10 am.

Presentation on Wildfire Policy in Transition
The policy evolved over the 20th century. The

was established by the

Colorado General Assembly The Colorado General Assembly is the state legislature of the State of Colorado. It is a bicameral legislature that was created by the 1876 state constitution. Its statutes are codified in the ''Colorado Revised Statutes'' (C.R.S.). The ses ...

in 1955 and oversees response to wildfires in Colorado. Part of the 2002 Colorado wildfires that burned nearly 360,000 acres, the Hayman Fire was the largest wildfire in Colorado state history for nearly 20 years

Colorado Wildfires, State & Private Lands, 1978–2009.

br>Colorado Wildfires Broken Down By Decade (with charts).
until the

Pine Gulch Fire The Pine Gulch Fire was a wildfire that burned in Mesa County and Garfield County, Colorado in the United States. The fire was started by a lightning strike and first reported on July 31, 2020 and quickly grew, resulting in the fire being named t ...

surpassed it in August 2020.Pine Gulch fire becomes largest in Colorado history as firefighters near full containment

Colorado Sun ''The Colorado Sun'' is an online news outlet based in Denver, Colorado. It launched on September 10, 2018, to provide long-form, in-depth coverage of news from all around Colorado. It was started with two years of funding from blockchain ventur ...

, 27 August 2020, accessed 28 August 2020. The

Cameron Peak Fire The Cameron Peak fire was a wildfire that started near Chambers Lake, Colorado, east of Walden and southwest of Red Feather Lakes near Cameron Pass on August 13, 2020, and was declared 100% contained on December 2, 2020. The fire burnt 208,663 ...

became the largest wildfire in Colorado history seven weeks later, at a size of 206,667 burned acres as of October 21, 2020. The 2012 Colorado forest fires broke the record for most destructive fire twice and led to declaration of a

federal disaster area A disaster area is a region or a locale that has been heavily damaged by either natural, technological or social hazards. Disaster areas affect the population living in the community by dramatic increase in expense, loss of energy, food and serv ...

in June 2012.Associated Press (June 29, 2012)
Obama declares disaster in Colorado as fires burn.

Fox News The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...

The 2013 Colorado forest fires, fueled by high heat and winds again broke the record for the most destructive and included what was the second largest fire (by area) in Colorado history until being surpassed by several fires in 2020. With multiple record-breaking fires, the 2020 Colorado wildfire season became the largest in the state's history after burning .

List of fires

This list only covers the largest, most destructive fires in Colorado history. Colorado State University (CSU) has information on named fires from 1976 to 2006 and total wildfires from 1960 to 2009. According to CSU, wildfires in Colorado burned less than per decade over the 1960s and the 1970s. For the 1980s and 1990s, the total was over per decade. For the 2000s, the total was approximately . Notable fires from before 1980 are also included, sourced mainly from old newspapers and records. All fires greater than and all but one over occurred in the 21st century. Acreage of fires that are partly in Colorado are indicated in red.

References

External links

Wildfire History – Colorado State Forest Service
via

Colorado State University Colorado State University (Colorado State or CSU) is a public land-grant research university in Fort Collins, Colorado. It is the flagship university of the Colorado State University System. Colorado State University is classified among "R1: ...

Colorado Mountain Home Wildfire Mitigation
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Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

Wildfires A wildfire, forest fire, bushfire, wildland fire or rural fire is an unplanned, uncontrolled and unpredictable fire in an area of combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identif ...

List of fires

See also

References

External links