Two people have been killed in the massive wildfire in Bastrop.

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Bastrop County Sheriff Terry Pickering said Tuesday that he had no details about the deaths. Officials said they were not firefighters.

The Texas Forest Service says nearly 600 of the torched homes were in Bastrop County, some 25 miles from Austin. The agency said that blaze was still uncontained Tuesday. It was the most destructive fire of the year for a state that has had more than 3 million acres burned, said state emergency management chief Nim Kidd.

The number of destroyed homes is expected to go higher as officials assess hard-hit areas, Kidd said.

Gov. Rick Perry, who interrupted his campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination, toured one of the fire-ravaged neighborhoods Tuesday morning.

"Pretty powerful visuals of individuals who lost everything," Perry said. "The magnitude of these losses are pretty stunning."

He deployed the state's elite search team, Texas Task Force 1, to the area to help look for possible fire victims.

Calmer winds Tuesday were expected to help in the battle against wildfires that flared up when strong winds fed by Tropical Storm Lee swept across Texas over Labor Day weekend.

Texas Forest Service spokeswoman Victoria Koenig said it was too early to say how much progress was made fighting the wildfire in Bastrop County. The agency says the fire has grown to 30,000 acres.

"It's encouraging we don't have winds right now, not like yesterday," Koenig said early Tuesday.

Even with the encouraging conditions, Koenig said it was a "tough, tough fire" that was raging through rugged terrain, including a ridge of hills.

"You can still see the hills glowing quite a bit," she said.

Five heavy tanker planes, some from the federal government, and three aircraft capable of scooping 1,500 gallons of water at a time from lakes took part in the fight.

At least 5,000 people were forced from their homes in Bastrop County, and about 400 were in emergency shelters, officials said Monday.

"I just saw our home about an hour ago, and it's a complete loss," area resident Cody Whitfill said. "We lost everything."

Whitfill said he was forced to leave his home on Monday.

"As soon as the fires hit, most of us were evacuated," he said. "We're all safe."

In Bastrop, a town of about 6,000 people along the Colorado River, huge clouds of smoke soared into the sky and hung over downtown Monday. When winds picked up, flames flared over the tops of trees. Helicopters and planes loaded with water flew overhead, and firefighters along a state highway outside the city converged around homes catching fire.

The fire was far enough away from Austin that the city was not threatened, but it consumed land along a line that stretched for about 16 miles, Texas Forest Service officials said.

On Sunday, about 200 miles to the northeast in Gladewater, a 20-year-old woman and her 18-month-old daughter died when a fast-moving wildfire gutted their mobile home.

The disaster is blamed largely on Texas' yearlong drought, one of the most severe dry spells the state has ever seen.

Wildfire Precautions:

State officials said that when weather conditions make wildfires more likely, people should prepare by taking the following precautions:

• Keep firefighting tools handy, such as a ladder long enough to reach the roof, a shovel, a rake and buckets.
• Place connected garden hoses on all sides of the house for emergency use.
• Know all emergency exits from your house.
• Learn all routes leading out of your neighborhood.