On a weekend when thousands of people were forced to flee a ferocious wildfire that destroyed hundreds of homes along Okanagan Lake, others were lighting illegal fires nearby, and in other parts of British Columbia’s Interior ravaged by blazes.
The B.C. Conservation Officer Service said Thursday that officers patrolling the Clinton, 70 Mile House, Okanagan Lake and Boston Bar areas — all of which have been threatened by out-of-control major fires that remain out of control — handed out 18 tickets for illegal fires over the long weekend, when hot weather and powerful winds turned some fires into infernos.
The impact of the eruption in fire activity continued Thursday, with the evacuation zone along the shores of Okanagan Lake expanding south, while a fresh contingent of 200 Mexican firefighters arrived in B.C., ahead of an expected deployment to the Brunswick complex of fires near Boston Bar.
The Conservation Officer Service said the fines were issued over the weekend in areas where fire prohibitions are in place, although it did not specify if the fires were campfires or other burns. All are banned in the areas described by the service.
“The impacts of wildfires on people, communities, and livelihoods are very real,” the service said in a statement on social media.
“We are asking everyone to do their part by respecting fire restrictions and road closures.”
Total fire bans are in place in the Kamloops, Cariboo and Southeast fire centres, which have been hardest hit by the surge in fire activity, while a partial campfire ban is in place for coastal B.C.
The previous weekend, the service said it issued 19 campfire violation tickets.
The 1,400 firefighters battling blazes across B.C. will soon be reinforced by the Mexican crews who were welcomed by Premier David Eby in Abbotsford, B.C., on Thursday.
Eby said stories of “heroism and mutual support” were arising from wildfire battles across the province.
“There are literally thousands of people across the province that are stepping up to help out those who are evacuated … and those who are facing the threat of forest fire,” he told a news conference at the Abbotsford airport.Emergency crews near Okanagan Lake continued to guide people away from the complex of blazes in the area where hundreds of homes were destroyed last weekend.
An update from the Central Okanagan emergency management centre on Thursday said upgraded evacuation orders applied to two dozen more properties along Westside Road on the western side of the lake.
The latest orders mean more than 2,600 people have been forced out of their homes due to the out-of-control Quilpituk Creek fire. That’s in addition to those forced out by the Bradley Creek blaze further north along the lake in the Regional District of North Okanagan and on Okanagan Indian Band reserve lands, where neighbourhoods were incinerated and at least 230 homes were destroyed on Saturday.
The Quilpituk Creek blaze spans just over seven square kilometres. Central Okanagan Search and Rescue said Thursday that its members helped evacuate homes on Westside Road with RCMP and Penticton Search and Rescue.
Eby said the Mexican firefighters who arrived for a 14-day deployment were part of a group of 600 coming to help from other parts of Canada and the world.
He said the Mexican crews would likely be assigned to the Brunswick complex of fires in the Fraser Canyon, where some residents remain on evacuation order, while others have been allowed to return home after more than a month away.
“They will provide much-needed support and relief for our front-line wildfire fighters to be able to recover and then return to the front line to continue their important work after the temporary crews go home,” the premier said.
A Facebook post by the New South Wales rural fire service said several dozen crew members from Australia and New Zealand had also departed for Canada for a five-week deployment.Given the extra support, Eby said the wildfire service has indicated it has sufficient resources for the time being.
“That key question of, do we need additional resources, was answered for me quite firmly by the wildfire service (saying), ‘Look, if we had double the number of wildfire fighters in the early days up at the Big Bar fire, it wouldn’t have made a difference,” he said of the blazes that have destroyed structures on about 120 properties in the Clinton area.
Still, he said he expected the province would continue to expand its wildfire service to respond to what Eby described as “growing threats.”
Asked if the province was considering a state of emergency, he said B.C. reserves provincial-level states of emergency when it needs powers that otherwise aren’t available.
“We’re advised that as of this moment that I’m speaking to you, that is not required, but we have some very challenging weeks coming up, I’m told by the BC Wildfire Service,” he said.
Among the earlier evacuees from around Okanagan Lake was Reilly Hogarth, who said he and his neighbours tried fighting the Bradley Creek fire as flames moved toward his and other homes on the Okanagan Indian Band reserve.
Hogarth said they did their best to soak down structures and trailers using a long firehose fed by a pump from the lake, but the winds were strong and the flames came within about six metres from the back of his home.
“There was very little we could do,” he said. “So, we mostly just spent our time trying to contain the fire to what had already burned and keep it from jumping through the neighbourhood and burning more structures.”
Hogarth’s neighbour snapped a photograph of him with a firehose over his shoulder, pulling it through the charred ruins of the trailer park. He said in that moment they were “trying to save as much of our neighbourhood as we could” while also trying to keep themselves out of danger.
Hogarth has been staying with family in nearby West Kelowna and was hoping to be able to go home soon.
B.C.’s wildfire fight also reached Metro Vancouver this week, where an evacuation alert was briefly issued for a few dozen properties in the Anmore area, about 40 kilometres east of Vancouver, after a blaze was spotted Wednesday.
But the 1.5-hectare fire burning in Belcarra Regional Park was declared held on Thursday by Brant Arnold-Smith, incident commander with Metro Vancouver.
He told a briefing that fire crews encountered downed power lines at the scene. The fire is thought to have been caused by human activity.
Evacuees in the Fraser Canyon were meanwhile returning home after several weeks, with the downgrading of evacuation orders in and around Boston Bar.
Patricia Ross, board chair for the Fraser Valley Regional District, said there was a lot of work ahead for returning residents, but it was “a step in the right direction,” the BC Wildfire Service having deemed the situation safe enough for a return.
“We’re really crossing our fingers and hopeful that it stays that way, so that they can stay home, and the weather doesn’t give us some trouble.”
In the East Kootenay region, all evacuation orders and alerts related to the Wait Creek fire east of Kimberley, B.C., have been rescinded.