LOS ALAMOS, N.M. (AP) - A wildfire near the nation’s premier nuclear weapons laboratory and a northern New Mexico community has grown to more than 103,800 acres, or 162 square miles.
That makes it the largest forest fire in New Mexico history. After burning for six days, the blaze near Los Alamos has surpassed the Dry Lakes fire, which blackened more than 94,000 acres of the Gila National Forest in 2003.
The Los Alamos National Laboratory is closed because of the fire, and the nearby community of Los Alamos is evacuated. But crews remain confident they can keep the blaze from spreading to the lab and the town.
Some of the more than 1,200 firefighters assigned to the fire are working to bolster lines along the lab’s southern edge and the community’s western side.
Fire managers are bracing for conditions to get hotter and drier.
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