Dozens of new fires in BC, amid evacuations and alerts

National Observer

5 days ago

There's been a surge in wildfire activity in British Columbia associated with this week's high temperatures and thousands of lightning strikes, with dozens of new fires sparked in just one day.
Multiple evacuation orders were in place across the province on Thursday, including for lakefront properties near Nanaimo on Vancouver Island, homes in the Okanagan Valley and two First Nation reserves near Lytton.
By late Thursday, the BC Wildfire Service online dashboard showed more than 40 new fires in the past 24 hours.
Almost half of the more than 90 fires burning across the province were started since Wednesday and the service said that number is expected to rise.
"Yesterday, approximately 13,167 lightning strikes were recorded across B.C., with over 9,000 occurring within the Prince George Fire Centre," the service said in a statement on Thursday.
It said with the hot and dry conditions this week, "fuels are extremely susceptible to ignition."
Emergency officials in the Okanagan Valley said the hot temperatures made fighting a fire near Peachland difficult, although firefighting efforts on Wednesday helped tame the blaze.
A statement from Central Okanagan Emergency Operations said aerial drops of fire retardant and water were effective in reducing fire behaviour.
The fire was displaying rank-two fire behaviour, meaning "a surface fire with some open flame and a slow to moderate rate of spread," the emergency agency said.
The blaze spread quickly on Wednesday, forcing police and fire crews to go door-to-door to evacuate residents from about 400 properties near Peachland.
Another 225 properties were put on evacuation alert due to the fire that started Wednesday afternoon and quickly spread through tinder-dry brush.
By Thursday, alerts and orders had been downgraded, with residents at 118 properties told they still had to stay out, while 490 properties were on evacuation alert.
The operations centre said in a statement that no structural loss was reported.
Emily Gow with Todd's Lakeside RV, located south of the blaze, said it was 'just up the highway,' but the business was not among the evacuated properties.
Gow said she could see flames on Wednesday, but by Thursday the fire appeared to have calmed down.
'They're only dealing with little hot spots. There's no raging fire that's blooming all over the place.'
She said guests were concerned the fire could get out of hand, but staff from the area weren't as worried.
'We've got guests anywhere from up the road to in Europe staying with us right now, so people were having a mixed range of emotions toward the fire,' she said, adding guests from Switzerland had checked in at about 11 p.m. Wednesday after delays due to highway closures in the area.
Environment Canada has issued more than two dozen heat warnings in B.C., including in the central Okanagan, where temperatures could reach 38 C on Thursday.
Temperatures were expected to moderate on Friday, a weather statement said.
On Vancouver Island, an evacuation order was issued for properties in the Nanaimo region including waterfront properties on the north side of Cameron Lake and a portion of Little Qualicum Falls Provincial Park.
Rebecca Taylor, a spokesperson for the Nanaimo Regional District, said "a few dozen" properties were covered by the evacuation order.
A statement from the district said additional properties to the northeast of the lake are under an evacuation alert, meaning residents should be ready to leave if required.
The Lytton First Nation issued an evacuation order Thursday for two sparsely populated reserves due to immediate danger posed by the out-of-control wildfire nearby, about 10 kilometres south of the village of Lytton.
The order said residents were to leave the Lytton 26A and Skwayaynope 26 reserves immediately and head to a reception centre.
Officials with the Lytton First Nation said there are only two households on the reservation plots, one of which is unoccupied, while the other belongs to a member of the First Nation firefighting team on the front lines of the fire.
A spokesman for the First Nation said it was not the same area evacuated in June 2021, when much of Lytton was destroyed by a wildfire and two people were killed.
The current Lytton wildfire was recently measured at 6.5 square kilometres and continues to burn out of control, causing the Thompson-Nicola Regional District and local First Nations to issue a series of evacuation alerts this week.
Barj Dehaan said he was driving back home to Vancouver on Wednesday when he started seeing smoke about 30 kilometres east of Lytton.
"As I got closer, I could see this huge plume of smoke. And as I got closer, I could see the literal fire as well, trees on fire. I have not seen a live fire like that before,' he said Thursday.
He said the region has been very hot.
"The air quality was poor, and I could feel a burning sensation in my throat, strong smell of burning wood. And then I started thinking about the people who live in that town, that here they are again, having to deal with a fire that seems to be out of control,' he said.
The BC Wildfire Service has meanwhile upgraded a blaze in the Fraser Valley to a "wildfire of note" and is warning campers to leave the Harrison Lake area as roads are closed ahead of the long weekend.
The 65-hectare Bear Creek fire is the first fire of note in B.C. since July 9, when the Izman Creek blaze near Lytton lost that status.
— With files from CHNL