B.C. wildfire crews embrace cooler temps but warn of increased heat to come

A break in the summer weather has helped B.C. wildfire crews get ahead of some of the fires burning in the province.

However, with an increase in temperatures expected starting this weekend, the BC Wildfire Service isn’t letting its guard down.

BC Wildfire Service fire information officer Jaedon Cooke says with warmer and drier conditions incoming, crews are keeping an eye on all parts of the province.

“Those conditions really take the moisture out of the fuels and make the fuels more susceptible to ignition and increased rates of spread if it’s coupled with wind,” she said.

“Of course, we’re also going to be keeping an eye on areas that have existing fire activity and really making sure that we action those fires.”

As of Wednesday afternoon, there were just over 335 active wildfires across B.C., six of them wildfires of note.

Cooke says the central Interior and Southeast Fire Centre are seeing much of the activity right now.

“This is largely due to the fact that they didn’t receive the same amount of precipitation and cooler temperatures that the rest of the province did,” she explained.

“With that said, there was some scattered precipitation in those regions and our crews have been having success with their suppression operations these past few days, and the cooler temperatures have reduced fire activity, somewhat, to support the ground crews.”

Cooke says there have been roughly 1,000 fire starts between now and the beginning of 2024. For the same time period last year, that figure was closer to 1,500.

“Fire activity historically increases dramatically through late June, July, and August,” said Cooke.

“The number of active wildfires we’re seeing at this point is similar to what we saw at this point last year. It is worth noting, though, that the total number of hectares burned is quite lower than what we saw at this point last year.”

“So even though we have similar number of active fires burning this year, it is quite different from what we were seeing last year in terms of overall fire behaviour and activity,” she continued.

The BC Wildfire Service says the reprieve has allowed it to relocate some resources from the embattled northeast, where there’s been a good amount of rain in recent days, to other parts of the province.

Some crews have been moved to the southeast, where there are a number of hot spots, including near Slocan.

Cooke is reminding people to stay vigilant, noting the wildfire season is ongoing and that conditions can deteriorate rapidly.

“Summer’s not over yet and a return to challenging conditions is a real possibility,” she said.