Natural Resources Canada is predicting normal forest fire conditions for the Prince Albert and area.(File Photo/ paNOW Staff)

By Ronald Quaroni

Fire Forecast

Preparing for the fire season

May 21, 2019 | 2:00 PM

A slow start to the fire season in the province isn’t causing a slowdown in preparation.

Natural Resources Canada explained that the prairies, including Prince Albert and Northern Sask. are looking at a normal fire risk for the summer.

Richard Carr, a fire research analyst with NRC said that even under normal conditions you can see a lot of fires.

“Northern Saskatchewan is quite fire prone. It’s got one of the largest areas that burn regularly.” Carr said. “It’s a concern especially for remote communities that it may be a little harder to get out of.”

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Northern communities deal with the brunt of the fire risk in the province.

Cliff Buettner, the forestry program director with Prince Albert Ground Council said they’ve been preparing.

“We’re working proactively to be ready for fires and involve people in our communities to be firefighters,” Buettner said. “Education and prevention. We’re doing work in communities prior to any incidents.”

A big part of the prevention work involved the FireSmart Program.

“Part of that is fuel hazard reduction work on areas deemed to be high risk or the communities most likely to have an incident with fires,” Buettner told paNOW.

There are currently nine active fires in the province.

So far in 2019 there have been 73 fires provincially far below the five year average of 129.

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Ron.quaroni@jpbg.ca

Twitter: @RonaldQuaroni