WATCH: Lightning has sparked a wildfire near Ashcroft, B.C. Catherine Urquhart has the latest.
KAMLOOPS, B.C. – Lightning sparked an aggressive, growing wildfire near Ashcroft, B.C. and the district issued an evacuation alert on July 20. That ordered was lifted on July 23.
The BC Wildfire Service says the Coldstream Creek fire, located 15 kilometres southeast of Ashcroft, was discovered Monday and grew to 250 hectares fuelled by hot, dry conditions and strong winds.
Residents of 24 homes in the area were on evacuation alert, prepared to leave at a moment’s notice.
Forty-five firefighters were on the scene and had a number of resources battling the lightning-caused blaze, including three helicopters and 16 pieces of heavy equipment.
Get daily National news
Firefighters worked hard to keep the flames from encroaching on homes. Sprinkler protection units guzzled up at least 10,000 litres of water every hour.
READ MORE: Full wildfire coverage across B.C.
An evacuation order was issued late Monday for the area surrounding Bolean Lake, including the Bolean Lake Resort, due to an aggressive wildfire between Bolean Lake and Falkland.
The fire southwest of Salmon Arm covers close to 350 hectares and the order affects 24 properties.
Provincial Fire Information Officer Kevin Skrepnek says in the last 24 hours, 60 fires have started across B.C. and almost all of those have been sparked by lightning.
There have been almost 1,200 wildfires this season in B.C. and there are currently 216 burning, 15 of which are considered major fires.
Evacuation alerts or orders are in place for residents near five fires, including an alert for residents near Kelowna in the Bear Creek area.
-with files from Global News
Comments
Want to discuss? Please read our Commenting Policy first.