Cooler conditions kept the wildfire away from Tumbler Ridge this weekend but officials say the winds could change at any moment.
Fire crews have been hard at work hosing down the community that 2,400 people call home.
But the West Kiskatinaw wildfire is still very close to Tumbler Ridge, where all residents were ordered to evacuate on Thursday.
”I do have all the faith in our local fire department, the mutual aid partners that they’ve brought in, that they’re here to put boots on the ground, they’re here to do the job that they’re doing and they do it best,” Mayor Darryl Krakowka said Sunday.
At this time, all eyes remain on the weather.
In the meantime, an evacuation order was issued for 14 more properties north of Fort St. John due to the Donnie Creek wildfire.
The BC Wildfire Service said gusty winds on Sunday afternoon led to aggressive fire behaviour, which caused the blaze to grow to the south.
An additional evacuation order and two alerts were also issued for some rural areas along Highway 97 North.
The wildfire service also warned the fire could reach Highway 97 north of Trutch within the next 24 hours, and urged people in the area to closely monitor DriveBC for updates.
The fire is nearly 466,000 hectares in size, making it the second-largest wildfire in B.C.’s history.
The Plateau fire, which broke out in 2017, northwest of Williams Lake, is still the biggest in the province’s history.
On Vancouver Island, a convoy of essential goods arrived in Port Alberni on Sunday with the coastal region still isolated by the Cameron Bluffs wildfire.
The scheduled convoys between Port Alberni and Lake Cowichan are meant to ensure the arrival of goods while Highway 4 remains closed.
The detour takes trucks through several gravel and forest service roads, adding four hours to the journey.
B.C.’s Ministry of Transportation continues to monitor the road closure
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