"JEFFERSON COUNTY, Colo. -- Families driven from their homes by a fast-moving wall of fire Monday evening said they stayed longer than was safe because authorities told them that the smoke they were smelling was from a controlled burn that was being monitored."

"'I thought we weren't going to make it,' said Kim Olson, who barely escaped the fire that killed her neighbors, Samuel, 77, and Linda 'Moaneti' Lucas, 76. 'I thought we were going to die right there.'

On Wednesday afternoon, Colorado State Forest Service deputy forester Joe Duda said the Lower North Fork fire that has scorched more than 4,100 acres of land, burned 27 homes and killed the Lucases sparked from a controlled burn on Denver Water Board land last week."

Kirk Mitchell, Carlos Illescas, and Jordan Steffen report for the Denver Post March 29, 2012. [2]