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Fire crews on Elk Fire in Wyoming brace for strong winds

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Fire crews on Elk Fire in Wyoming brace for strong winds


Update 12:55 p.m. Friday

The Sheridan County Sheriff’s Office has announced updates to evacuation orders and road closures.

From the Sheridan County Government Facebook page:

UPDATE UPDATE
Ready Set Go area and New Road Closures just announced

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Working with the team managing the Elk Fire, the Sheridan County Sheriff’s Office has changed the evacuation levels in a few areas and added some new areas. Areas that are now in “Go” or “Set” will see law enforcement presence and will be contact by law enforcement.
New areas in “Go” include:
Eaton’s Ranch
New areas in “Set” include:
West of Beckton Road from Dayton, continuing south to the intersection of Beckton Road and Big Goose Road. This also includes the area west of Rapid Creek Road.
New area in “Ready”:
The area west of Bear Gulch Trail to Big Horn Road to Beaver Creek Road to Owl Creek Road and then directly north to Soldier Creek Road and then west to Beckton Road.
New road closures, with access only to locals:
Beckton Hall Road at the intersection with Big Goose Road
Bighorn Road at intersection of Beaver Creek Road
Big Goose is closed at the intersection with Beckton Road

Stay vigilant and respect law enforcement as they work the area.

_______________________________________

Original Report

Fire crews in Wyoming battling the Elk Fire in the Bighorn National Forest are bracing for strong winds.

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Fire officials said in a Friday morning update the wildfire is now estimated at 51,115 acres with 0% containment. The fire started by lightning on Sept. 27 and has caused numerous road and school closures and evacuations.

There are currently 528 personnel assigned to the fire, which is being managed by Rocky Mountain Area Complex Incident Management Team 3.

‘Families in crisis’: Dayton remains on edge as Elk Fire burns in Wyoming

Here’s the full text of the Friday morning update:

Key Messages: A Red Flag Warning has been issued by the National Weather Service for Friday at noon until Saturday at 6:00 p.m. The forecast includes temperatures in the upper 70s to low 80s and relative humidity in the teens. Winds are forecast to shift from the southeast to southwest and west during the day, gusting up to 30pmh in the afternoon. Overnight tonight, the winds are expected to shift to be out of the northwest and gusting up to 50mph; this is associated with the passage of a cold front. With this anticipated hot, windy weather, it is likely that there will be an increase to the size of the fire.

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With an anticipated increase in fire activity due to critical fire weather today through Saturday, please keep all county and local roads clear. If you stop to look, you could stop first responders.

Current Situation: After having previously used a bulldozer to create a fireline, fire crews utilized an Unmanned Aircraft System to implement a successful burnout operation west of the Horseshoe Subdivision yesterday. By intentionally placing fire on the ground between the fireline and the main fire, fire managers were able control the rate at which the vegetation was burned under calmer conditions. This tactic was utilized to lessen the chance of fire advancing upon structures in the future. Overnight, crews continued burning vegetation to increase the distance between structures and the southeast side of the main fire.

Today, crews will continue preparing structures to be defensible from fire in the Little Bighorn Canyon. Along the eastern side of the fire, crews will continue to extinguish areas of heat along established firelines. This same work will be done in the vicinity of yesterday’s burning operation. Around the perimeter of the fire, crews will use a variety of structure preparation techniques, including the removal of vegetation near structures, constructing fireline, and placing hose and sprinklers where possible.

Firefighter and public safety remain the top priority. The tactics used to suppress the fire will be determined by the terrain, fire and weather conditions, and medical response time with a focus on only implementing plans and tactics that have a high probability of success.

Closures and Evacuations: In advance of the forecast weather, additional evacuation levels were added yesterday afternoon by the Sheridan County Sheriff; all previous evacuation levels remain in place. Please contact the Sheridan County Sheriff’s Office at 307-672-3455 or Sheridan County Emergency Management at 307-752-2174 for more information.

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US Highway 14 remains closed from Dayton to Burgess Junction. For additional road closures, please visit the Sheridan County Emergency Management website at Sheridan County (sheridancountywy.gov).

ELK FIRE INFORMATION

Fire Information Phoneline: 307-303-7642
Time: 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bighornnf
Email: 2024.elkfire@firenet.gov
InciWeb: http://inciweb.wildfire.gov/incident…/wybhf-elk-fire-2024

RELATED Q2 COVERAGE

Elk Fire in Wyoming reported at nearly 50,000 acres

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New evacuations ordered at Elk Fire in Wyoming

Elk Fire at 32,000 acres, Dayton, Wyoming residents remain cautious

Elk Fire in Wyoming estimated at more than 25,000 acres





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Rivalries and Playoff Positioning Highlight Week 11 Wyoming Girls Basketball Slate

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Rivalries and Playoff Positioning Highlight Week 11 Wyoming Girls Basketball Slate


It’s Week 11 in the 2026 Wyoming prep girls’ basketball season. That means it’s the end of the regular season. 3A and 4A schools have their final game or games to determine seeding before the regional tournament, or if a team is locked into a position, one last chance to fine-tune before the postseason. Games are spread across four days.

WYOPREPS WEEK 11 GIRLS BASKETBALL SCHEDULE 2026

Every game on the slate is a conference matchup. Several rivalry contests are part of this week’s schedule, such as East against Central, Cody at Powell, Lyman hosting Mountain View, and Rock Springs at Green River, just to name a few. Here is the Week 11 schedule of varsity games WyoPreps has. All schedules are subject to change. If you see a game missing, please email david@wyopreps.com.

CLASS 4A

Final Score: Laramie 68 Cheyenne South 27 (conference game)

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CLASS 3A

Final Score: Lyman 40 Mountain View 26 (conference game)

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CLASS 4A

Final Score: Evanston 41 Riverton 39 (conference game)

Final Score: Natrona County 42 Kelly Walsh 38 (conference game) – Peach Basket Classic

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Final Score: #4 Thunder Basin 64 Campbell County 32 (conference game)

CLASS 3A

Final Score: #1 Cody 77 Worland 33 (conference game) – 5 different Fillies with a 3, and Hays led the way with 34 points.

Final Score: #2 Lander 49 Lyman 34 (conference game)

Final Score: #4 Wheatland 51 Douglas 40 (conference game)

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Final Score: #5 Powell 48 Lovell 42 (conference game)

Final Score: Burns 56 Torrington 43 (conference game)

Final Score: Glenrock 78 Newcastle 30 (conference game)

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CLASS 4A

Rock Springs at #2 Green River, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

#4 Thunder Basin at #5 Sheridan, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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#1 Cheyenne East at #3 Cheyenne Central, 6 p.m. (conference game)

Jackson at Star Valley, 6 p.m. (conference game)

CLASS 3A

#3 Pinedale at Mountain View, 4 p.m. (conference game)

#1 Cody at #5 Powell, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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Buffalo at Glenrock, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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CLASS 3A

Newcastle at Buffalo, 12:30 p.m. (conference game)

Glenrock at Rawlins, 3 p.m. (conference game)

Torrington at #4 Wheatland, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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Submit a Score to WyoPreps

 

Wyoming Boys 4A Swimming & Diving State Championships 2026

4A Boys State Swim Meet for 2026 in Cheyenne

Gallery Credit: David Settle, WyoPreps.com





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Political storm in Wyoming as far-right activist caught handing checks to lawmakers

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Political storm in Wyoming as far-right activist caught handing checks to lawmakers


Controversy has engulfed Wyoming’s state legislature after a conservative activist was photographed handing checks to Republican lawmakers on the state house floor, in an incident that has highlighted intra-conservative divisions and the role of money in the Cowboy state’s politics.

The political storm started on 9 February, when Karlee Provenza, a Democratic lawmaker, took a photo showing Rebecca Bextel, a conservative activist and committeewoman for the Teton county Republican party, handing a check to Darin McCann, a Republican representative, on the legislative floor. Marlene Brady, another Republican representative, stands in the photo’s background, a similar piece of paper pinched between her fingers.

“You have a person from the richest county in the country coming down to Cheyenne to hand out checks on the house floor,” Provenza said. “I have never seen something so egregious.”

Questions around the checks were soon swirling, and answers weren’t forthcoming. When asked what Bextel gave to her, Brady told a reporter for local outlet WyoFile: “I can’t remember.”

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Then Bextel herself addressed the incident. “I raised $400,000 in the last election cycle for conservative candidates, and I will be doubling that amount this year,” Bextel wrote on Facebook on 11 February. “There’s nothing wrong with delivering lawful campaign checks from Teton county donors when I am in Cheyenne.”

Since then, it has emerged that the checks came from Don Grasso, a wealthy Teton county donor, who told the Jackson Hole News and Guide that he wrote the checks for Bextel to deliver to 10 Freedom caucus-aligned politicians. Grasso said the checks were intended as campaign contributions, and were not tied to specific legislation. It is unclear how many checks were ultimately delivered, but two of four confirmed recipients include the speaker of the house, Chip Neiman, and John Bear, the former head of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus.

The Wyoming house has formed a legislative investigative committee, and the Laramie county sheriff’s office said they’d open a criminal investigation.

Bextel declined to answer questions from the Guardian. Brady, McCann and Bear did not respond to requests for comment.

Neiman said he considered the criticism a “wraparound smear campaign”. He said: “It never once crossed my mind that this was bribery.

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“These legislators, myself included, are now guilty until we can prove that we’re innocent. How is that right in this country? Isn’t that a little bit backwards?”

The scandal has highlighted long-standing divisions in Wyoming’s Republican party, which in recent years has seen a growing divide between old school, more moderate conservatives and a harder-right Freedom Caucus.

Several former Republican lawmakers forcefully condemned their colleagues for accepting the checks, and a local Republican party branch called for the lawmakers’ resignations.

Ogden Driskill, a Wyoming Republican senator, told the Guardian he does not consider Bextel’s actions to be illegal, but that “just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should”.

Bextel has spent years pushing against housing mitigation fees in Wyoming, and Driskill noted that she distributed the house floor checks just days before a bill she had publicly supported was set to be heard. Bextel was registered as a member of the press, not as a lobbyist when she delivered the checks.

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“Ethically and morally, it’s bankrupt to a massive degree,” Driskill said.

Neiman said that he and other legislators who received checks have supported similar bills in the past: “Bribery is paying somebody to do something they would not otherwise do.”

Nationally, the 2024 election cycle saw record-spending from the mega-wealthy, as well as dark money groups. Wyoming followed the trend, in a tense red-on-red primary season.

For those gearing up to campaign this year, Teton county, the richest in the US, and Bextel’s picturesque home turf, is an essential stop. Its extreme wealth gives it a foothold on the national level as well. Palantir chief executive Alex Karp and Donald Trump attended an annual Republican leadership fundraiser at Jackson Hole in 2024, and JD Vance attended the same one in 2025.

Bextel pulls dollars from Teton county into the Freedom Caucus side of Wyoming’s conservative split. She hosted no-press-allowed meet and greets earlier this year benefitting leading candidates for Wyoming’s governor and open US House seat.

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In an interview with the Open Range Record, a media network she co-founded, Bextel said controversy around the checks was solely because she was making “even playing field” in Wyoming against the state’s more moderate Republicans, who she calls “George Soros” candidates. She said that she will be sure to keep raising money – just away from the legislative floor.

“I guess I’m gonna ask all the gentlemen and gentleladies to step outside the Capitol while I hand them a check,” Bextel said. “Let me be clear: I’m doubling down.”

But it’s not just wealthy local donors putting their weight behind the factions. Last election cycle, out of state groups spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on anonymous and often inaccurate mailers.

“These actors, especially from the far right, they like to push the bounds of the norms,” said Rosa Reyna Pugh, an organizing and advocacy consultant at Western States Center, an Oregon-based non-profit focused on democracy in the western United States. “They like to see what policies they can kind of push, and see where they can play a piece,” Reyna Pugh said.

While Neiman and Driskill fight politically, they do agree on one thing: summer will bring an expensive and brutal campaign season.

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“You’re going to see more dark money than you’ve ever seen. We’ve done absolutely nothing to enforce it. Our secretary of state has not even made a slight attempt to deal with it,” Driskill said. “You’re going to see lots and lots of outside money and I think you’re seeing it on both sides.”

As national questions swirl around pay-to-play politics and profiteering in the Trump administration, Provenza wants better for the Cowboy State.

“We should not be aligning ourselves with how the federal government is conducting itself or how federal elections conduct themselves,” Provenza said. “We owe something far better and more honest to the people of Wyoming than that.”



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Wyoming man reaches plea deal to avoid jail time in wolf-abuse case

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Wyoming man reaches plea deal to avoid jail time in wolf-abuse case


A Sublette County man who captured and brought an injured wolf into a bar in February 2024 has struck a deal with prosecutors that could keep him out of jail, reports WyoFile.

A signed plea agreement filed with the Sublette County District Court and acquired by WyoFile on Wednesday afternoon means that Cody Roberts, 44, would likely no longer face trial. It had been set to begin March 9.

Under the deal, Roberts withdraws his earlier not guilty plea and changes that plea to guilty or no contest for felony cruelty to animals.

The deal calls for a prison sentence of 18 months to two years that would be suspended in favor of 18 months of supervised probation and a $1,000 fine. Additionally, agreed-upon conditions of his probation include: no hunting or fishing; no alcohol, presence at bars or liquor stores; and a requirement that Roberts follow recommended addiction treatment.

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As part of the deal, the parties are asking that a “pre-sentence investigation report” be ordered by the court.

Roberts allegedly acquired a wolf by striking it with a snowmobile, leaving it “barely conscious” on Feb. 29, 2024. Photos and video from that night showed him posing for pictures with the animal and even kissing it. The wolf’s behavior suggests that it was gravely injured, according to biologists who’ve reviewed video of the muzzled animal while it was prone and barely moving on the floor of the Green River Bar.

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department initially handled the incident, issuing Roberts a $250 fine for possession of warm-blooded wildlife. The state agency declined to seek stiffer penalties or jail time, and Game and Fish officials maintained that predatory animals, including wolves, were exempted from felony animal cruelty laws.

Sublette County law enforcement officials disagreed. In August, prosecutor Clayton Melinkovich convened a grand jury that indicted Roberts for felony animal cruelty. That crime could have put Roberts in jail for up to two years, though his plea agreement averts mandatory time behind bars as long as he successfully completes probation.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.

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