Colorado community concerned about wildfire risk, over 1,000 residents practice evacuation drills

Most experts agree that the summer of 2026 could be a very active and dangerous fire season in Colorado. That's why one of the state's most vulnerable communities spent their Saturday morning preparing.

Much like the meager melting snowfall, it started off as a trickle, eventually gathering at a lower elevation. It was the stream of people in the hills of Evergreen evacuating their homes.

"We are petrified, it is so dry. It has never been this dry. We've always worried about wildfires, but this year it's not an if but a when, I think," said Evergreen resident Sarah Forbes.

This wasn't an emergency, just a drill put on by Clear Creek and Evergreen firefighters and the Clear Creek and Jefferson County Sheriff's Offices. They say practice is important because if a fire starts in or near Evergreen, getting people to safety will take a lot of work.

"The roads weren't built for mass evacuations. The populations are growing up here in the mountains, and getting that many people out in a very short period of time is going to be a challenge," said Evergreen Fire Chief Michael Weege.

The drill gives the fire and sheriff's departments data they can use in a real emergency, and highlights flaws in the system that can be fixed ahead of time.

"We're hearing some things about the 911 system itself. The notice came out as spam on their phone, and that could be a setting on their phone not recognizing the number," said Weege.

And residents got a chance to shore up their own evacuation plans. Forbes said they had to re-evaluate things partway through the evacuation drill.

"We had already packed our bags a while back, and we had a list of last minute items to plan to grab. And then my husband starts pulling up with all these bins and boxes from the basement. I was like, 'What is all this?'" said Forbes. "He thought we were taking two cars."

Forbes said she'd rather take one car and that they would need to pare down the items they bring during an evacuation.

Officials say they were blown away by the community's willingness to participate in this exercise. They say they were expecting a couple of dozen volunteers to evacuate their homes. Instead, they got around 1,300.