A blazing start to British Columbia’s fire season has left more forest in ashes than five times the size of the City of Vancouver. And summer has only just begun.
More than 62,000 hectares have burned since April 1, which dwarfs last year’s numbers which only saw 5,500 hectares burned during the same time-frame. 2014 ended up being the third most devastating fire season in the province’s history.
The province has already used 90 per cent of this year’s wildfire budget.
“While we are approaching the $63 million mark the province will always spend what’s necessary to protect people and property,” says Ryan Turcot of the BC Wildfire Management Branch.
A record-breaking dry month of May and similar weather in June has contributed to large wildfires across the province including Little Bobtail Lake, Lytton and the Elaho Valley.
The window for any help from Mother Nature is quickly closing. Instead of cooler, wet weather more typical for this time of year, Environment Canada Meteorologists are expecting a heat wave to hit parts of the province.
Get daily National news
“May and June we typically see some good amounts of rain and we haven’t seen much. And July and August are our driest months of the year, ” says Matt MacDonald. “So if we don’t see any rain in the next two weeks, which I’m not seeing, it’s not looking like a very good summer.”
MacDonald says a weather blog is contributing to the hotter, drier summer and an El Nino weather system is building to take over in the fall and winter. He says long-range forecasts are even predicting for a winter similar to last year.
While some municipalities like Mission have banned open campfires, BC Wildfire Management Centres have yet to do so.
Marg Drysdale of the Coastal Fire Centre says they are monitoring the situation closely and expect more regions to hit extreme threat levels as we head further into the summer months.
People living on Know Mountain in Kelowna were the latest to see the threat of wildfire, the community was issued an evacuation alert, Monday night, which has since been rescinded.
“First crew on scene did discover fire and flames in the trees and being wind-driven up Knox Mountain towards Magic Estates,” said Platoon Captain John Kelly of the Kelowna Fire Service.
Some residents didn’t take any chances.
“I doused the roof with water just in case embers start flying,” said Peter Arthur.
The fire has since been contained. Kelowna firefighters still working to douse some of the hot spots.
Comments
Want to discuss? Please read our Commenting Policy first.