Fire investigators blame a squirrel for one of Colorado’s fires that threatened homes

In a state currently battling wildfires that have consumed more than 260,000 acres this year, investigators have determined that the latest brush fire to threaten homes south of Denver was started by… a squirrel.

South Metro Fire Rescue said a squirrel came into contact with a power line Wednesday evening near 6544 Village Road, southeast of Parker in Douglas County, sparking a vegetation fire at around 5:45 p.m. The blaze quickly grew serious enough that firefighters upgraded the response to a second-alarm brush fire and evacuated five homes. Rattlesnake Fire, Elizabeth Fire and Franktown all responded, and a Douglas County helicopter made eight water drops to slow the fire’s spread.

The good news: The two-acre fire was declared under control about an hour after it started. All five evacuated families were back home by 9 p.m., and no structures were damaged. The squirrel, it should be noted, did not survive the encounter. We will not be naming it.

The timing is grimly ironic. Colorado is in the middle of what may be its worst wildfire season since 2020, with fires like the Aspen Acres blaze in Pueblo and Custer counties destroying hundreds of structures and scorching tens of thousands of acres across the state. The Front Range has been baking in extreme heat all week — the same heat that’s buckling pavement in Boulder County — and fire conditions remain dangerously dry. Against that backdrop, learning that a single rodent on a power line can evacuate an entire neighborhood is the kind of thing that makes you appreciate just how thin the margin is between a normal Wednesday evening and a second-alarm brush fire.