Bear Creek wildfire displaced residents allowed to return home

NEAR WEST KELOWNA – Three days after being chased out of their homes by a raging and rapidly advancing wildfire, they’ll sleep in their own beds Wednesday night.

Residents of 105 properties ordered out of their homes because of the Bear Creek wildfire were allowed to return at noon Wednesday after emergency officials lifted the evacuation order.

“Very nice to be home,” says Traders Cove subdivision resident Craig Wolf. “It’s terrible to be kicked out and you don’t take anything with you and you don’t know what’s going to happen.”

The evacuation was ordered on a moment’s notice late Sunday night as a wall of flames bore down on their homes.

“We collected the things that matter most to us, says displaced resident Jim Jennings. “If you want to test your world, get evacuated because you grab those little mementoes from when the kids were small, photo albums, identification. Those are the first things you grab, all the other material things just don’t matter.”

The residents are very happy they have homes to return to, grateful for the fire crews who likely saved the neighbourhood.

“I really thought I wasn’t going to see my house again,” says Jeanette Morton. “The firefighters have been amazing. I don’t know how they stopped it because when we left it was maybe a couple hundred meters down the road and it was just a wall of swirling smoke and orange.”

After being out for three days, electricity to the fire affected area has been restored and Westside Road has reopened to traffic.

The bear creek wildfire is about 85 per cent contained and covers an estimated 53 hectares.