In the last seven days, there have been 23 new wildfires detected in Northeast BC. 13 of the new fires have been in the Dawson Creek Fire Zone, four in the Fort St. John Fire Zone and six in the Fort Nelson area.
Of the new fires that started over the weekend in the Dawson Creek and Fort St. John Fire Zones, one west of Chetwynd is still burning out of control. It is one hectare in size and is burning near Highway 97.
All six fires that were detected this weekend in the Fort Nelson Zone are still burning out of control. Four of the six fires suspected to be zombie fires from 2023, that have re-ignited due to dry and windy conditions.
Karley Desrosiers with the BC Wildfire Service said, “There is a cluster of fires along Highway 77 that crews are working on right along the highway.”
“A lot of the fire activity really can be attributed to those unseasonably high temperatures on Thursday and Friday as we have temperatures upwards of 25 degrees. Those two really hot days and then windy conditions throughout the weekend, along with a very, very dry air mass, was kind of the perfect storm for a number of fire starts and pretty quick growth of these fires,” said Desrosiers.
Despite the winds, crews worked on a number of the fires overnight on Friday and Saturday. Both ground crews and heavy equipment gained a lot of ground on the fires over the two day span, according to the Wildfire Service.
The Wildfire Service said that human activity is primarily the reason that fires start this time of year. All of the fires that started in the Peace Region this weekend are believed to be human caused.
But the Wildfire Service is also quick to credit the public in reporting new fires.
“There’s a couple key factors that that when it comes to how quickly we can get on top of these fires. One of them is just how aware the public are and how much they are reporting. So the quicker that we are made aware of a fire, the quicker we can get to it to respond,” said Desrosiers
Drought conditions in the area continue to play a major role this wildfire season.
“We know things are really dry. It’s going to be really windy. We anticipate fire starts so we are requesting resources from elsewhere in the province to support both with initial attack and sustained action on these fires,” added Desrosiers.
While temperatures this week aren’t expected to be as hot as last Thursday, a cold front will pass across the province again on Tuesday and Wednesday.
“We’re seeing temperatures gradually creep up and then come Tuesday, Wednesday, going to see stronger winds and we have no real reprieve in the dryness. So things are going to remain windy, very, very dry with humidity in the single digits to teens, which is incredibly dry,” said Desrosiers.
The Wildfire Service said the next week is a critical period for the public to be extra cautious. The public is being asked not to do any open burning, especially is windy conditions.