Hundreds of British Columbia residents remain under an evacuation order as of Monday morning as more than 360 wildfires rage across the province.
They include all residents of the village of Slocan, a community of about 380 people in a part of southeastern British Columbia where several out-of-control wildfires are raging, including two notable ones – fires that are highly visible or pose a threat to public safety.
According to DriveBC, Highway 6 along Slocan Lake remains closed for a nearly 40-kilometer stretch from south of Slocan to just past New Denver in the north.
Dan Seguin of the Regional District of Central Kootenay’s emergency operations centre said Monday morning it was a busy weekend for his team after issuing an evacuation warning for Slocan on Saturday, which was upgraded to an evacuation order on Sunday morning.
By the time the order went into effect, more than half of Slocan’s residents had already left town, Seguin said.
“It’s hard to leave the house,” Seguin told CBC’s Daybreak Kamloops Presenter Shelley Joyce.
“We got that early warning from BC Wildfire Service … and that gave residents enough time to pack up, make sure their house was in order and make the decision to leave early.”
Jason Lawler, operations manager of an Australian team working in the area, said the difficult terrain, dry fuel and smoke in the region had made the work of crews working there difficult.
“It is critical for us to keep an eye on weather conditions over the next few days,” he said in a video posted on social media by the BC Wildfire Service (BCWS).
According to Environment Canada, there is a possibility of rain showers in the region on Monday.
According to BCWS, rain and lower temperatures in recent days have improved fire danger in some areas, but many communities remain at risk.
An overview of the fire situation on Monday morning shows that more than 1,400 people are currently battling the forest fires in British Columbia.
It also says that nearly half of the 364 fires currently burning in British Columbia are out of control and about 90 percent of active wildfires were caused by lightning strikes. There are six notable wildfires in the province.
The wildfire at Shetland Creek, about 70 kilometers west of Kamloops, has necessitated several evacuation orders and alerts for the surrounding area; the fire has now spread to almost 250 square kilometers.
The Thompson-Nicola Regional District issued a new evacuation order for some properties south of Spences Bridge on Sunday and extended an evacuation warning to another 152 properties in the same area due to the massive fire.
As predicted by fire authorities, a forest fire in Sooke Potholes Park also spread over the weekend. As of Monday morning, its size was estimated at 2.3 square kilometers.
The BCWS says it will conduct a planned ignition on the north side of the Calcite Creek wildfire on Monday if conditions are “favorable.”
