By Savannah Eller and Nick Smith

The wait has no end in sight for evacuated residents of Rye, near where the Aspen Acres fire continues to burn in rough, tinder-dry terrain to the west.

While about 6,400 people have been able to return to communities like Colorado City, Wetmore and Beulah, Pueblo County Sheriff David Lucero told attendees at a community meeting Tuesday night that conditions were not yet safe for an additional 3,000 displaced people.

“I wish I had the answer,” he said.

The problem, explained Brad Washa, operations section chief with the Alaska Complex Incident Management Team, is fuel and weather. He said the part of the fire burning near St. Charles Peak is finding extremely receptive fuel in Engelman spruce trees, many of which are standing-dead casualties of beetle kill.

He said the team was concerned about the possibility of thunderstorms pushing the fire east toward Rye, though crews have been working to establish a front line and conduct mitigation.

“We’re feeling pretty comfortable about the fire until we get to Rye,” he said.

Tuesday was the last day of the Alaska team’s tenure on the fire, completing a 14-day rotation. The team was called in to fight the Aspen Acres fire as closer assets were already assigned to fires statewide. Starting Wednesday, the Northern Rockies Incident Management Team 6 will be in charge.

“We’re ready to take the fire on tomorrow morning,” said Incident Commander Rich Cowger.

While nearly 1,900 people are still fighting the fire, some assets have been called away, said Washa. Standing at 99,077 acres, the fire is 36% contained as of Tuesday.

The weather is expected to remain hot, dry and windy for most of this week, with winds forecast from the east or east-southeast. Incident meteorologist Sophia Adams said Tuesday night that monsoonal moisture was forecast to blow in Thursday through Sunday.

Much of the firefighting activity was concentrated in the southwest portion, where the fire remains uncontained. A new wave of evacuations was ordered on the fire’s south side in a sparsely populated part of Huerfano County late Tuesday morning.

Over two weeks after its spark, authorities have yet to fully assess the damages in Rye, Pueblo County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Gayle Perez said Tuesday.

According to Lucero, 236 homes have been counted as burned in the county, along with nine commercial businesses.

According to a Tuesday morning briefing from the Alaska team, the weather was favorable enough to continue burning operations, allowing crews to remove fuels between the constructed line and the wildfire near Mingus Ranch. Several days of mop-up work, extinguishing remaining hot spots and monitoring are ahead.

Two miles northwest of Rye, the fire remains active near North Muddy Creek. Crews are constructing defensive lines between the fire and communities in this area. A structure protection group is assessing threats to homes in the Rye area and all along the west side of the fire, including San Isabel and other communities to the north.

Activity is low on the northeast side, prompting Pueblo authorities to lift more evacuations Tuesday.

The incident management team said the fire is still a “lurking threat” in the northeast due to the potential of highly flammable juniper trees near a populated area.

Firefighters will continue to work the area as residents return, using chainsaws to remove brush and lower tree limbs and water to cool smoldering hot spots.

Most areas had good to moderate air quality Tuesday, but officials warned that sensitive groups would be at risk on the southern end of the fire.

Custer County Commissioner Paul Vogelsong said the county fair was still a go this week despite intermittent smoke pollution in the past two weeks on the north end of the fire. He said workers had sprayed down the fairgrounds in Westcliffe to mitigate both dust and fire risk.

He said the High Mountain Hay Fever Bluegrass Festival was a success this past weekend, despite some decreased attendance. With businesses depending on the summer season, he said events in the county were going ahead.

“It’s going to be a long road,” he said of the fire’s effects.