A wildfire spreading across the Texas Panhandle became the largest in state history Thursday, as a dusting of snow-covered scorched prairie, dead cattle, and burned-out homes gave firefighters a brief window of relief in desperate efforts to corral the blaze.
The Smokehouse Creek fire grew to nearly 1,700 square miles (4,400 square kilometers) over a vast, rural landscape of prairie and scrub brush cut by rocky canyons and dotted with oil rigs.
It merged with another fire and is just 3% contained, according to the Texas A&M Forest Service.
Gray skies from early cloud cover and the snow painted a bleak landscape: huge scars of blackened earth, charred houses that still smoldered, and dead cattle burned and stiff in the cold.
Authorities said 1,640 square miles (4,248 square kilometers) of the fire were on the Texas side of the border.
Previously, the largest fire in recorded state history was the 2006 East Amarillo Complex fire, which burned about 1,400 square miles (3,630 square kilometers) and resulted in 13 deaths.
Firefighters have made little progress taming the Smokehouse Creek blaze, but Thursday’s forecast of snow, rain, and temperatures in the 40s offered a brief chance to make progress before temperatures and winds increase again Friday and into the weekend.
Authorities have not said what ignited the fires, but strong winds, dry grass, and unseasonably warm temperatures fed the blazes.
