The wildfires that tore through Oklahoma over the weekend, killing at least four people and destroying nearly 300 structures, also burned down the ranch of the state’s governor, Kevin Stitt, the governor said in a video posted to social media.
The video, posted on Saturday morning, shows Mr. Stitt, a Republican, standing amid blackened trees and rubble at what he describes as his farm. At a news conference that day, the governor said his farmhouse was north of the town of Luther, Okla.
“We knew it had burned down, but I just wanted to show it to you — we’ll be rebuilding with all of Oklahoma,” Mr. Stitt says in the video, panning the camera away from himself and toward the ground, which is covered in debris, broken bricks and ash. “This was my place,” he adds. “Total loss.”
The video then shows an area sunken into the earth with half-standing walls and a metal container, which the governor describes as his basement and gun safe. The chimney is still standing. “We’ll be rebuilding with the rest of Oklahoma,” Mr. Stitt says in the video. “You never think it’s going to happen to your place, and these wildfires just come out of nowhere, and can really take over,” he adds.
His office did not immediately respond on Monday afternoon to requests for an interview about the burned property.
The wildfires, which began Friday, raced across drought-stricken land, forcing evacuations from the Texas Panhandle to the outskirts of Oklahoma City. Among the hardest-hit areas was the university town of Stillwater, where about 50 structures were lost, Mr. Stitt said at a news conference on Saturday.
He described visiting neighborhoods where just a few homes had been spared, while the rest were little more than rubble. “It was a perfect storm,” Mr. Stitt said at the news conference. He has declared a state of emergency for 12 counties.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has approved Oklahoma’s request for more than a dozen fire management grants across several counties. These grants will help reimburse local governments and volunteer fire departments for costs associated with responding to the fires.
In a statement posted on social media on Sunday, President Trump said that his administration was “actively monitoring” the severe weather affecting states across the South and the Midwest and that it was ready to assist state and local officials. He added, “Please join Melania and me in praying for everyone impacted by these terrible storms!”
Officials said on Saturday that it was unclear what had started the fires, though Mr. Stitt said that downed power lines and controlled burns could have played a role in some of them. About 170,000 acres had burned in the state, he said.
The fires were fueled by low humidity, dry vegetation and hurricane-force winds that turned the sky orange, downed utility lines and consumed homes and other buildings, just two months after thousands of homes and businesses burned in the Los Angeles wildfires.
Critical fire conditions persisted on Monday, in areas including some that had already burned. Forecasters warned that more “very destructive” fires could spread uncontrollably, declaring a critical fire risk on Monday and Tuesday across eastern New Mexico, central and western Texas, most of Oklahoma, eastern Colorado, eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska.
