DENVER (KDVR) — A helicopter assigned to help fight the Derby Fire ended up in a lake 13 miles northwest of the Eagle County Regional Airport on Friday.
The U.S. Forest Service for the White River National Forest said the incident occurred at about 4:10 p.m. on Friday, and said the helicopter pilot was picked up by another aircraft assigned to the Derby Fire and flown to the Eagle County Regional Airport.
The pilot was checked out by emergency medical personnel and determined he was fine, besides minor bumps and bruises.
Additionally, the National Transportation Safety Board has been notified, but it’s unclear if the agency will be responding to the incident. The U.S. Forest Service had an investigative team en route at about 6:30 p.m., according to a press release.
Derby Fire continues to burn, prompts new pre-evacuations
Eagle County Emergency Management added three new zones along Colorado River Road to pre-evacuation status on Friday, and the roadway remains closed to non-residents at the roundabout north of Dotsero.
The pre-evacuation zones are now close to Interstate 70, although the fire does not appear to be threatening the interstate in any way as of Friday night.
The fire had grown to 4,112 acres as of Friday evening, according to InciWeb, a government site for wildfire reporting, which is up from about 3,569 acres on Friday morning.
There is not yet any containment of the fire, which sparked on Aug. 16.
Officials also shared on InciWeb that the fire is not being driven by wind, but instead by available fuels. Fire managers were also concerned about the fire potentially breaching into the Sweetwater Creek drainage, and have worked to protect over 200 structures along the roadway to Red Dirt Creek through positioning sprinkler kits and removing surrounding fuels.
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