The fire, called Sheep Fire, is one of more than 30 fires that were active on Monday and have burned about one million acres in five states, according to the National Interdepartmental Fire Department. The fires, combined with a heat wave in the southwest, have been fueled by prolonged drought and wind conditions. Fires have led to forced evacuations in Arizona and Southern California. The largest wildfires occurred in New Mexico, where they threatened construction and spread to 680,000 acres in the state’s national forests, the Fire Department said Monday. The cause of the fire is under investigation, said the California Department of Forests and Fire Protection, which said the fire was “particularly provocative due to dense vegetation, steep terrain and strong and unstable winds.” As of Monday afternoon, evacuation orders for a large portion of Wrightwood, a community of 4,500 people, remained in place, said Mara Rodriguez, a spokeswoman for the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Office. Wrightwood, at 6,000 feet in the San Gabriel Mountains, is a mountain resort community 15 miles offstream, according to its website. More than three million people in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah were alerted by the red flag, which indicates an increased risk of fire. In northern Arizona on Monday, thick smoke was visible from US 89, which was closed north of Flagstaff, the Arizona Department of Transportation said. Two large forest fires, Pipeline and Haywire, caused multiple evacuations and issued warnings about possible additional evacuation orders. The pipeline fire, which was first reported Sunday morning, just six miles north of Flagstaff, had risen to about 5,000 acres since late Monday night, according to the National Interdepartmental Fire Department. The U.S. Forest Service announced Sunday that it had arrested a 57-year-old man in connection with a pipeline fire and charged him with unspecified breaches of natural resources. In a press release, the agency did not name the man and said it would not discuss details of the investigation. Early Monday morning, the Haywire fire started just northeast of the Pipeline Fire, officials in Ariz County, Coconino, said. Within six hours, it had already burned 1,600 acres. The Meteorological Service in Flagstaff said Monday that critical weather conditions were on fire in the area. Weaker winds are expected to return by mid-week, he said, and rain and thunderstorms are likely by Friday. Dangerous heat was expected to extend from the midwest to the southeast by the middle of the week. As of early Tuesday morning, more than 110 million people in the southern and central United States were on alert or warnings of heat, according to the Meteorological Agency. Mike Ives contributed to the report.
