Dylan and Madi Whiteman will never forget the surreal moment they realized they had only minutes to flee their home in Kelowna.
By the time the pair heard that embers from the McDougall Creek wildfire had crossed Okanagan Lake last Friday, Aug. 17, the trees behind their hillside house were burning and fire trucks were in the driveway.
“It was absolutely crazy,” Madi said after returning to their charred property on Friday.
“We got home and we knew it got close. But like, there’s burned trees that fell into our yard. And, like, our whole backyard, which is usually full of trees — this beautiful landscape — is black, which is insane.”
The land may be torched, but the house is still standing, thanks to the quick work of firefighters.
“I just feel lucky that the house is still there. Obviously, some people are less fortunate than us,” Dylan told Global News. “We’re incredibly grateful.”
Across Kelowna, evacuation orders have been downgraded to alerts and residents are beginning to return to homes with varying degrees of damage.
Earlier this week, officials had reported five homes were lost completely — a small number compared to the 90 along the North Westside and 84 across West Kelowna and Westbank First Nation.
Kelowna resident Laddy Sanetrik said it was “unbelievable” how fast the fire spread last week. And when he saw ashes starting to fall, he grabbed a hose and began drenching his roof as a precaution.
Within an hour, somebody drove by and warned him that the fire had arrived.
“It was just behind the property. The flames, maybe at that point, (were) 20 or 30 feet up in the air,” he said.
Sanetrik and his family were able to stay with friends, who offered what he described as a “good distraction” from the “emotional” possibility that they may never return to the home they knew.
“I thought for sure there’s no way this can be saved. That was based, my assumption, on how fast the fire spread on the other side of the lake. Thank God, everything is cool.”
Like the Whitemans, Sanetrik’s home was saved.
“Heroes, thumbs up,” he said of the firefighters, choking back tears.
“A blessing from the skies … the house is still there, nobody got hurt. All the neighbours are fine. It was just very emotional. It’s been a week from hell, but a beautiful ending.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau toured West Kelowna on Friday, thanking first responders with similar enthusiasm, describing the past week as “terrifying.”
“This is all about everyone coming together to be there for each other. That’s what we’re seeing from individuals,” Trudeau said.
“There is no question there are there are lots of extraordinary stories of heroism, of effectiveness, of things that we’ve learned from years past, well put into place now.”
The McDougall Creek wildfire is still burning out of control at an estimated 12,318 hectares in size.
The nearby fires that make up the Grouse Complex, however — Walroy Lake and Clarke Creek — are now classified as “held,” unlikely to spread beyond the BC Wildfire Service’s boundaries.
Planned ignitions continue to remove any fuel in the area that hasn’t yet burned, with a 130-hectare aerial operation set to take place from the top of the Bald Range area.
“We’re trying to bring that fire edge down to our guard. And what that’s going to do is prevent any kind of fire behaviour down towards the home. It also brings the fire into a more operable area,” said BC Wildfire Service incident commander Brad Litke, addressing the McDougall Creek blaze.
“Right now, it’s the northwest corner, which is not very visible from the valley in the communities below. Our primary objective is to secure the communities in the valley bottom.”
Wildfire officials are warning residents that they will see smoke over the weekend from these operations.
As of 4 p.m. on Friday, evacuation orders were downgraded to alerts for 838 properties in West Kelowna, as well as 247 in Lake Country. In those areas respectively, 1,828 and 408 properties remain under evacuation orders.
Evacuation alerts were rescinded altogether Friday for 312 properties in West Kelowna and 19 in Westbank First Nation.