With winds gusting over 30 miles per hour at times, firefighters couldn’t keep the flames that destroyed one house east of Lamesa Tuesday afternoon from eventually engulfing another just yards away. Fighting a defensive battle from the start, however, they were able to keep the flames from spreading to four other nearby houses on the same property. But even in that effort the intense heat from the rolling flames melted the letters on firefighters’ helmets and forced them at one point to turn a cooling spray of water onto their own trucks. “It was plenty hot,” Lamesa Fire Chief Larry Duyck said. Neither of ...