A campfire ban spanning almost all of British Columbia comes into effect Friday, as officials warn the province is heading into a potentially severe wildfire season.
The ban will start at noon in an attempt to try to reduce wildfire risk. The sole exception to the ban is in the Haida Gwaii Forest District.
“We are forecasting and anticipating the potential for a drastically accelerated situation here,” said Emergency Management Minister Bowinn Ma at a news conference Thursday.
There are currently 150 wildfires actively burning in the province, following a week of extreme heat and lightning strikes.
Jean Strong with the B.C. Wildfire Service (BCWS) said the risk for more fire starts remains high, even with slightly cooler temperatures on the way.
“As anyone in the southern half of the province will see, we’re still hot. It’s cooled off, but it’s cooled off from 40 C to 33 C,” she said in an interview.
Hundreds of properties on alert
An evacuation order issued Wednesday is still in effect for the northeast corner of the District of Wells in the Cariboo region. Wells Mayor Ed Coleman said the order covers a small mine site of about 10 employees, as well as backcountry recreation lakes.
Other parts of Wells are under evacuation alert, covering around 350 properties, while more than 300 additional rural properties south of Dawson Creek, B.C., are also under an alert due to the threat of wildfire.
An evacuation alert means residents must be ready to leave at a moment’s notice.
An evacuation order issued Tuesday by the Fort Nelson First Nation for its remote Kahntah reserve is also still in place.
Nova Scotia sends crews to B.C.
Twenty Nova Scotia firefighters and an agency representative from that province’s natural resources and renewables department are flying to B.C. on Friday to help fight out-of-control wildfires in the region around Prince George, according to the Nova Scotia government.
This comes as the B.C. government said it’s looking for outside firefighting help, specifically 180 firefighters, specialists and bucketing aircraft, to help aid the full complement of 2,000 BCWS firefighters now on duty.
“By being proactive in our request for additional resources, we can ensure that lag that it often takes for additional resources to come in from out-of-province doesn’t impact our ability to protect communities,” Ma said.