Utah wildfire forces evacuation of small town as extreme heat roasts US west

Extreme heat and dry, windy conditions are fueling multiple wildfires across the US west, including a massive blaze in Utah that forced the evacuation of a small town, with hot weather in the forecast raising the risk of more blazes in the week ahead. The Iron fire in Utah’s Juab county was first detected on Saturday and has so far blackened more than 2,000 acres. The fire, about 70 miles (113km) south-west of Salt Lake City, forced the evacuation of Eureka, population 1,000, and people at a nearby ranch. No homes had been lost, and Utah Fire Info, a multi-agency operation, said in a post on X that firefighters conducted a successful operation to protect the town. Kelly Wickens, a fire prevention specialist with the Utah division of forestry fire and state lands, warned that the fire was continuing to grow amid drought conditions. Wickens said the fire was human-caused and remains under investigation. Spencer Cox, the governor of Utah, visited the town on Sunday. “We knew that there was going to be extreme fire danger, and sure enough we had multiple fires,” Cox said. The Iron fire was one of six fires burning in Utah at varying levels of containment. In neighboring Colorado, the south-west corner of the state was under a red-flag warning issued by the National Weather Service until Monday, due to gusty winds and low relative humidity. The Iron fire burns outside near Eureka. …