Stephanie Valdez saw thousands’ worth of damages and repairs after the Marshall Fire caused interior damage to her Louisville home in 2021. Without renters’ insurance, Valdez and her children moved from their dwelling of four years into a nearby Comfort Inn for the interim. The single mother of four, who has multiple chronic illnesses, relies on a $2,500 monthly disability payment to cover the family’s expenses.
Fire Season
The Marshall Fire, which started late on New Year's Eve in 2021, killed two people in Boulder County, Colorado. Marshall became the most destructive fire in Colorado history. Though Colorado is no stranger to fire mitigation practices, methods across the state have since dictated the norm in an era of increasing drought and climate change in the mountain west.
Damage following the Marshall Fire is seen on Jan. 21, 2022 in Louisville.
One of Stephanie Valdez' children, Patrick Hoffert, 10, plays tablet games at a Comfort Inn in Louisville. The family of five, with multiple pets, moved into a two-bedroom suite after the Marshall Fire contaminated their home and belongings with smoke and ash.
A sufficiently-cleared forest area at lower montane elevation has open spaces and meadows instead of dense growths of trees. Forest thinning, a method of wildfire mitigation, reduces the density of trees, changing how a wildfire behaves so its path is less destructive.
Kim Christensen, above, watches as Samaritan's Purse volunteers sift through ashes to look for her family’s personal possessions that remain after the fire. The Christensens, a family of five, lived at their residence for over 17 years.
Dani Doyle trains Spencer Herda to cut down trees. Jefferson County foresters removed more than 50 trees a day during "thinning season" of 2022.
Dense overgrowths of trees, similar to ones pictured near the Sawmill Trail in Golden, can pose more risks for a destructive wildfire to spread in comparison to areas that have been thinned.
Beth Blacker noticed smoke damage and ash left in her rental unit after the fire, and was subsequently removed from her lease for requesting the damage to be cleaned. “I take care of the places I live; I am proud of where I live,” Blacker said. “I don't want to feel like I can't be happy where I live because of property management companies.”
Julia and Jaden Crawley sort through recovered belongings the family found after the fire.
Julia Crawley tattooed the family’s address, 378, to commemorate their former home on Blackfoot Street.
Houses along Sunshine Canyon Drive are seen in Boulder. Concerns about escape routes have gained renewed urgency after Marshall destroyed more than 1,000 homes in Boulder County. The Sunshine Fire Protection District, a fully volunteer-led district, has long pressed the county for better evacuation paths, fearing the 170 households in the area could trap residents in a fire with its narrow, steep roads — but the county doesn’t maintain routes behind County Road 83, citing limited local budgets.
Jefferson County Open Space rangers practice personal shelter procedures during an an annual fire training session March 2023 in Golden. Fire shelters are portable structures that firefighters deploy and cover themselves with to protect against extreme heat and smoke, increasing one’s chance of survival while waiting out the flames.
The Brodskys moved into a new home in June 2022 after the fire destroyed their home of 12 years. Gwen, James; and Ben and Lily Brodsky had minutes to gather belongings as they fled their old home in Coal Creek.
James Brodsky, a lifelong photographer, collected cameras and recovered a 35mm Nikon N90 following the fire.
A portion of a fire evacuation route, top, is seen from Gold Run Road in Boulder.
Peter Dente inspects a windowsill for residual ash that continues to seep through his house’s walls and foundation April 2023, more than a year after the Marshall Fire. The Dentes’ residence of nearly 30 years was the only one to remain standing out of almost a dozen surrounding houses, but is now uninhabitable due to the severity of ash and toxins that can’t be removed. “We really wish the house had burned down. It would have been much easier on us,” Dente said. “Because of our insurance policy, whatever it costs — they would've paid for.”
The Dentes’ yard, seen littered with chunks of charcoal that are still found and blown around the property in 2024.
Crew members of the Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control bury practice-fire lines that were dug near the Sawmill Trail in Golden. Fire lines, or fire breaks are gaps in vegetation that are dug to slow a wildfire.
Boulder County officials say they oppose adding more roads and water sources near existing county roads because it would promote overdevelopment. Extreme wildfires are projected to increase 14% by 2030 and 50% by the end of the century, according to a United Nations report.
Mike and Suzanne McKee and their children Maddie, 13, and Spencer, 10, survey the rebuild of their house near the Coal Creek neighborhood nearly a year after the fire. The McKee family had lived in their previous home for 12 years.
