Barack Obama visits Colorado towns devastated by wildfire - Telegraph.co.uk

"They are genuine heroes," Mr Obama said, after he visited a neighborhood where fires had struck indiscriminately, leaving some homes in ruins and others intact.
"You have a house that's cinders. Next to it, it's untouched," said Mr Obama, who saw homes that had been turned into blackened ruins and several vehicles melted down to the frames. A smell of burnt wood hung in the air.
"This community is obviously heartbroken," Mr Obama said, praising coordination between state and federal governments as they faced "enormous" devastation.
"We have been putting everything we have in trying to deal with what is one of the worst fires we have seen in Colorado."
Late Thursday, Colorado Springs police chief Peter Carey announced the first casualty of the blaze, saying a body had been found in a burned-out house and that another person was missing at the same address.
A police spokeswoman said the pair were believed to be husband and wife.
Officials fear others could have perished in the blaze that started on Saturday, and raged out of control on Tuesday and Wednesday whipped up by high winds.
"We've gotten calls from people who say they haven't heard from people," the spokeswoman said.
The fire, which has scorched some 16,750 acres , was just 15 percent contained.
Several other blazes across the mountainous western US state were straining firefighting resources.
"The focus for today is to hold what we've got, improve the lines that we have in place, use aerial assets as necessary to support the troops on the ground," fire incident commander Rich Harvey told reporters.
The plan is to bring in more heavy equipment where possible "to further enhance our ability to put muscle down on the ground in front of this fire and keep it in its containment lines," Harvey said.
Some 33 crews were fighting the blazes with 76 engines and 11 bulldozers. Three helicopters had dropped 384,205 gallons of water.
Officials in Colorado Springs met privately on Thursday night with distressed evacuees - many of whom fled with no time to collect their belongings.
"You never think it's going to happen to you," Rebekah Largent told reporters after leaving the meeting.
Her husband Byron said residents looked at lists of homes street-by-street.
"If your address wasn't there, that meant it (the house) was intact. And so you just look at the paper and you see destroyed, destroyed, destroyed, and you see one damaged and then destroyed, destroyed, destroyed," he said.

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