Crews with Nova Scotia’s Department of Natural Resources, along with several fire departments, are responding to a 20-hectare forest fire on the outskirts of Halifax Regional Municipality.
Natural Resources and Renewables said Friday a helicopter is dropping water and ground crews are working through the fire near Chaplin, N.S., close to Upper Musquodoboit and Dean.
“Response includes 20 provincial fire crew members, one helicopter, seven volunteer fire departments and (Halifax Fire),” read a tweet from the department.
As of 5:30 p.m., a CL-415 water bomber from Newfoundland and Labrador, which had been working on a 3,100-hectare wildfire in Yarmouth County, was en route to Chaplin to help with firefighting efforts.
At one point, Nova Scotia Power cut power for about 3,000 customers in the area so crews could work safely to put out the fire. Power has since been restored.
One of them was Erin Vigon, who lives near Dean. After losing power and hearing several fire trucks go by her home, she and her son went to nearby Lemmon Hill to get a better look at the fire.
Around 2:30 p.m. Friday, there was a “lot of smoke,” said Vigon.
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“A couple times you could see flames shooting up,” she said. “As I’ve been sitting here watching, it’s been getting a lot bigger from what I can see.”
She said her own home is far away enough from the fire that she wasn’t worried about it yet — but said “there are residents that are quite close to the fire.”
Fire response
Roy Hollett, the deputy fire chief of Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency, said the Department of Natural Resources is leading the fire response, but local fire departments are assisting them.
“Right now we have approximately 30 to 35 fire apparatus of various types and size, from rescue trucks, tankers, DNR trucks, and firetrucks,” in addition to the helicopter dropping water, he said late Friday afternoon.
“I know we’re waiting for that water bomber, we’re hoping that makes a significant impact on the fire.”
It’s unclear what the cause of the fire could be, but Hollett is reminding people to be careful.
“Even though with all the rain and the wet weather that we’ve had, these surface feels are really dry and it takes very little for these situation to start from a small incident to a pretty large fire,” he said.
“So just remind people you have to be safe, you got to be aware of what you’re doing especially if you’re on a trail, be careful.”
A burn ban was issued for the entire province on Friday.
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