The City of Regina is considering a fire ban amid prolonged dry conditions. The city has seen just 11.3 mm of rain in May according to Environment Canada and recorded its driest April on record with only 0.8 mm of precipitation recorded.
“I won’t say we’re really close, but we certainly are monitoring daily. Conditions are extreme,” Regina fire marshall Randy Ryba said. “The bit of rain that we had on the weekend doesn’t go very far. That grass that’s above the soil surface will dry out within an hour and it’ll burn as though there wasn’t any rain at all. We need a few days of steady rain.”
Regina has only ever issued one fire ban. That was implemented in September 2017.
Ryba made the comments at one of Regina’s City Buzz events where he stressed the danger of improperly disposing smoking materials.
“Smoker’s material causes a major impact to the city in any given year. In the past 12 months we had 15 occasions, all in residential properties, at the tune of over a million dollars lost,” Ryba said.
Ryba said some people aren’t aware of how dangerous throwing a cigarette in something like a flower pot can be.
“A lot of people think their flower pots and vases contain dirt. They certainly do not. They contain peat moss and peat moss will smoulder for hours.”
Ryba recommends disposing of smoking materials in a metal can filled with a bit of sand in the bottom.
“That will keep it from blowing away and will crush the butts in.”
Ryba also speculated on the idea of marijuana legalization leading to an increase in fires caused by smoking materials.
“A lot of times we can’t determine what kind of material started a fire, but the number of incidents probably will increase a little bit I’m sure.”