ALBUQUERQUE — Residents in areas west of Torreon were allowed back in their houses Tuesday as crews worked to corral a fire that has scorched more than 21 square miles in central New Mexico's Manzano Mountains.

Torrance County officials had called for evacuations last week after strong winds fanned the flames of the Trigo Fire, and it raced over a couple of ridges.

An unknown number of residents, including people from the Sherwood Forest subdivision north of the fire boundary, were able to go home around noon Tuesday, said fire information officer Francisco Lueras.

The human-caused fire, which is 60 percent contained, has burned 13,680 acres and 59 homes since it began April 15.

The weather was "pretty quiet" Tuesday morning, allowing crews using hand tools and bulldozers to make headway on the Trigo fire, said another fire information officer Linda Kearns. "Everything that we're working on is in the interior. We have not had any spillover," Kearns said.

Wind gusts of up to 35 mph were expected, but did not quite reach that level, Lueras said. The wind aided crews in locating some of the heat sources in the interior of the blaze, he said. "With those embers being fanned up, they were showing up a lot more, and they were able to extinguish those," he said.

Wind is expected to be between 15 and 25 mph today.

There were 774 people assigned to the blaze Tuesday along with 30 engines, 13 water tenders and three bulldozers. Helicopters have been dumping loads of water on burning areas.

The fire has been burning tinder-dry oak brush, piñon, juniper and mixed conifer trees on the east side of the Manzanos, where terrain varies from relatively flat lower areas to rugged higher country.

The fire has cost nearly $8.7 million to fight so far.

Representatives from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Small Business Administration and state and local officials surveyed the damage Tuesday.

In south-central New Mexico, crews were widening containment lines around a 3,860-acre blaze in the Sacramento Mountains on Mescalero Apache land, said Tom Berglund, a Forest Service public information officer.

Wind was forecast to gust up to 35 mph, but Berglund said, "That did not occur."

"We got some increased winds and low humidity, but not that bad," he said. "The lines held against that."

Crews performed extra patrols around the edges of the fire "to make sure there were no escapes," he said.

The human-caused South Tularosa Fire began Thursday about two miles southeast of Mescalero. It was 70 percent contained Tuesday, Berglund said.




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