TABIONA, Utah — The Yellow Lake Fire continues to burn in the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest.
Pat Russell, the operation section chief with California Incident Management Team 2 said Monday that the fire has burned around 30,600 acres and is 23% contained.
There are more than 800 personnel battling the blaze currently.
Monday night, a community meeting was held at Tabiona High School. Roughly 35 to 40 residents sat in the bleachers in the high school's gymnasium as fire officials and law enforcement spoke about where the fire stands now.
One of those residents was Tina Zufelt.
"We live in North Fork road and it's right up in here, my mother-in-law right up in here, and I live right down a little bit lower than her," Zufelt pointed out on a map.
Zufelt said she and a handful of her family members received a knock at the door on Oct. 5, saying they had to evacuate because of the Yellow Lake Fire.
"Well, I mean, it's almost a panic, you don't even know what to do, you know, and what do you take," said Zufelt.
She said she has a camper and has been able to utilize that while staying with a friend who hasn't had to evacuate.
Zufelt was able to return home, including on Monday, to retrieve some of her cats and other items.
"It was even hard to go there, and they gave us a little more time, and it was just really hard to even go there knowing that we had to leave," said Zufelt. "Initially, they said the order, the evacuation order, was for 30 days, so we don't know how long it is going to be, it just depends on what the weather does I assume."
Several fire and law enforcement officials addressed the crowd during the community meeting.
Russell said the goal of the meeting was to inform those who attended with accurate and transparent information pertaining to the fire.
He told FOX 13 News on Monday that there have been no structures lost since they took command, nor any loss of life.
Russell spoke about what the expectations are moving forward as they continue to battle this blaze.
"The good thing that we have with this cold front that's coming in as opposed to the one that drove the fire a couple of weeks ago," he said. "We're getting moisture with this cold front, so that will obviously help bring the fuel moisture in the fuels up, calm things down."
While Russell wouldn't go as far as saying this would necessarily put the fire out, he said it will moderate things. He went on to say it would allow them to tactfully maneuver around places where the fire would be too aggressive for them to put personnel in.
