Holiday weekend passes largely without incident
No major wildfires ignited and the weather was gorgeous as one of the hottest, busiest weekends of the year passed by largely without incident in Penticton.
“People generally behaved with a few instances of misbehaviour, which can be expected over a long weekend,” said Cpl. Don Wrigglesworth, who was reached by phone at the Penticton RCMP watch desk Monday.
One incident of note took place Saturday on Skaha Lake just off Airport Beach.
Around 8 p.m., police were called to a report of a boat collision with a child overboard.
Once on scene, officers discovered a motor boat with family of three aboard had collided with an empty pontoon boat that was at anchor.
Wrigglesworth said there were no injuries, but the child’s parents were found to be intoxicated, so the child was placed into the care of responsible adults. The child’s father, a 42-year-old Penticton man, was released with a court date related to the crash.
The weekend got off to a nerve-wracking start on Friday night when the region, which was still in the late stages of a week-long heat warning, saw thunderstorms roll through and spark 15 different blazes across the Kamloops Fire Centre.
Crews got on them fast, though, and by Monday afternoon had whittled down the number of active fires across the entire centre to 19, according to Gagan Lidhran, spokeswoman for the BC Wildfire Service.
The most visible of the bunch was a fire above the Rose Valley reservoir, which sparked multiple calls to 911 when it exploded to life Sunday afternoon about 11 kilometres north of West Kelowna, making it easily seen from parts of Kelowna.
Lidhran said the cause of the blaze, which was listed at just three hectares but still considered out of control as of Monday afternoon, is under investigation. The BCWS had 27 personnel and skimmer aircraft at the scene.
The largest fire burning in the region Monday was the 22-hectare Dry Lake fire about 24 kilometres northwest of Princeton. The B.C. Wildfire Service had 29 personnel and 11 pieces of heavy equipment on the ground there, plus aerial support. The fire was reported Sunday and believed to have been caused by lightning. No structures were threatened.
The second-largest fire burning as of Monday afternoon was near Solco
Creek, about 10 kilometres east of Okanagan Falls. With a guard in place around the perimeter, it was considered held at 14 hectares by the BCWS, which sent in 26 personnel and a helicopter.
The fire was reported July 30 and the cause is still under investigation.
Firefighters are expected to get a bit of a reprieve now with Environment Canada calling for temperatures in the low-30s to start the week, before dropping to the mid-20s from Thursday onwards.
According to the 10-day forecast, “It doesn’t look like we’ll be in store for another huge ridge of high pressure, at least until Aug. 13,” Environment Canada meteorologist Dave Wray said in an interview Monday.
“Having said that, it’s not going to be miserable conditions.”
Wray also warned of the possibility of lightning to coincide with the cooling trend.
“This ridge that will be setting up for (Tuesday and Wednesday) looks like it will start to break down Thursday day and evening with a fair amount of cooling aloft, which tends to trigger thunderstorms,” he explained.