雪松ATTANASIO和苏珊BRYAN Associa蒙托亚ted Press
LAS VEGAS, N.M. (AP) — With flames marching across wide swaths of northeastern New Mexico’s tinder-dry forests, firefighters were taking a stand Wednesday in their fight against the largest wildfire burning in the U.S. to keep it from pushing any closer to the town of Las Vegas and other villages scattered along the fire’s shifting fronts.
就像一场国际象棋游戏一样，Fire Bosses正忙于计划下一步行动，并寻找可以在大火前窃取燃料的景点，从而饿死了更多的木材和刷子。
Bulldozers for days have been scraping fire lines on the outskirts of Las Vegas, population about 13,000, while crews have been conducting burns to clear vegetation along the dozer lines. Airplanes and helicopters dropped more fire retardant as a second line of defense along ridge just west of town in preparation for the intense winds expected over the weekend.
Meanwhile, numerous fire engines and crews remained stationed Wednesday on the western edge of town.
Getting the right resources into the right areas when they can do the most good is the goal, fire officials said.
“And the chess board keeps getting bigger. That makes it even more complicated,” fire information officer Andy Lyon said Wednesday, referencing a peak and ridge on the northern end of the fire that weren’t factors just days ago. “So now that topography is part of our equation, part of the chess board.”
大火增至250平方英里（647平方公里），遏制停留在其周长的20％。在一个地区，大火在周三距离拉斯维加斯大约一英里，但真正担心的是周末60英里（96 kph）或更多的阵风在周末席卷该地区。
Officials at Los Alamos National Laboratory were warily tracking another wildfire that crept Wednesday within nearly 5 miles (8 kilometers) of facilities at the U.S. national defense laboratory based in Los Alamos.
Fire crews worked to widen a road road that stands between the fire and Los Alamos while clearing out underbrush and treating the area with fire retardant.
“目前，我们有信心缓解措施将保护实验室财产，”该实验室的荒地消防经理里奇·尼托（Rich Nieto）在一份声明中说。
科学家和消防专家说，由于气候变化，野火已成为干旱的西部的全年威胁 - 移动速度比以往更快，燃烧更热。消防官员还指出，长满和不健康的森林地区，建筑植被可能恶化野火。
Nationally, the National Interagency Fire Center reported Wednesday that a dozen uncontained large fires have burned about 436 square miles (1,129 square kilometers) in five states, including New Mexico. More than 3,500 wildland firefighters and support personnel are assigned to fires burning across the country.
拉斯维加斯市长路易·特鲁希略（Louie Trujillo）一直试图向居民保证，船员们不懈地工作，消防官员周三表示，他们对城市外建造的线路感到满意。
“People have not slept for weeks,” Trujillo said. “We know strategically where those engines need to be, we know strategically where the fire retardant needs to go, we know strategically where they need to drop water.”
While evacuations have yet to be ordered for the town, many residents are packed and ready to go and local school districts have canceled classes. An estimated 15,500 homes in outlying areas and in the valleys of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains that border the town have been affected by mandatory evacuations.
Martina Gonzales and her grandson watched Tuesday from their front yard as aircraft disappeared into a giant plume of smoke to fight the growing wildfire. Four-year-old Lukas yelled “airplane” every time one flew overhead in the effort to save Las Vegas, a commercial hub for the rural farming and ranching region.
Gonzales’ car was packed with valuables in case an evacuation order came, but she was not sure where they would go.
新墨西哥州州长米歇尔·卢扬·格里森（Michelle Lujan Grisham）要求发表总统灾难宣言，这将为恢复工作带来经济帮助。大火摧毁的房屋的统计时间约为170，但州长表示，一旦调查了损失，这个数字可能会增加。
当局说，在新墨西哥州大火的北部侧面，火线使火焰无法到达克利夫兰和莫拉镇。
上周，大火与四月初的另一场大火合并，当时土地管理者逃脱了遏制。其他大火的原因仍在调查中。
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蒙托亚·布莱恩（Montoya Bryan）从新墨西哥州的阿尔伯克基（Albuquerque）报道。美联社的作家保罗·达文波特（Paul Davenport）和圣达菲（Santa Fe）的摩根·李（Morgan Lee）为这份报告做出了贡献。Attanasio是美国州议会新闻倡议的美联社/报告的军团成员。Report for Americais a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. Follow Attanasio on推特.
