B.C. wildfires trending in right direction, fire service manager says

Nessman, who’s the manager of wildfire operations with the service, says crews are making “excellent progress” on the western flank of the 809-square-kilometre White Rock Lake fire that destroyed dozens of homes and chased thousands out from areas between Kamloops and Okanagan Lake.

He says B.C. will see a series of “fall-like (weather) patterns” in the next week, though there’s potential for new fires and growth until more rain arrives to address underlying drought in many areas of the province.

“All the signs are sort of pointing towards a fairly stable environment where we’re not going to see that elevated fire behaviour, conditions that we were quite concerned with and we experienced not that long ago, even a week ago.”

The fire service has somewhat downsized its aerial firefighting fleet, which Nessman says is a good indicator of crews’ progress battling nearly 250 fires.

The wildfire service is aiming for solid containment lines and a sustained lack of growth at the largest and most threatening blazes, Nessman says. That’s when it could recommend to local governments that some of the 111 evacuation alerts and 54 evacuation orders covering close to 3,800 properties may be lifted, he says.

Some of the larger fires have been burning since early July and the wildfire service expects to continue working to extinguish them for weeks to come, he adds.

B.C. has recorded 1,545 wildfires that have scorched more than 8,800 square kilometres of land since the start of the season, Nessman says.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 24, 2021.

The Canadian Press

by The Canadian Press

B.C. wildfires trending in right direction, fire service manager says

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