People need information promptly when forest fire breaks out

When a wildfire sends up a mushroom cloud of smoke over the South Okanagan on a July afternoon during an unprecedented stretch of hot, dry weather, the public shouldn’t have to wait four hours for an update from officials managing the emergency response.

Yet, that’s exactly what happened Sunday afternoon when the Thomas Creek wildfire sparked about five kilometres north of Okanagan Falls.

The rural area is governed by the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen, which took to Twitter at 3:42 p.m. to announce it had activated its emergency operations centre and then … nothing.

It wasn’t until 7:35 p.m. the RDOS revealed it had issued evacuation orders for 77 properties and 8:11 p.m. that it announced evacuation alerts for another 600 properties.

There followed one further announcement at 8:52 p.m. about the declaration of a state of local emergency. That’s it.

No commentary on which way the fire was moving.

No word on road closures. No information about threats to homes. Nothing.

Things got even more bizarre when the RDOS told the media to expect an online press conference at 8 p.m. and then postponed it to 9:45 p.m. without explanation.

It was later cancelled outright due to “technical difficulties.” Huh?

Most grandparents have mastered video calls. They’re not that technically difficult.

Now, we understand this was a rapidly evolving situation and the priority was saving lives and properties. We can’t argue with that. But we will argue the public should have been brought up to speed sooner.

This is the same RDOS that issued a press release Friday to announce a public survey for the new Naramata Liquid Waste Management Plan.

But a major wildfire? Crickets.

This is also the same RDOS that saw its woefully neglected IT system go down due to an attempted cyberattack in August 2020 during the Christie Mountain wildfire, which torched 2,000 hectares above the east side of Skaha Lake not far from where the Thomas Creek fire is now burning.

And this is the same RDOS that hired a consultant this spring to help craft a new communications policy for the 19-member board.

The rationale there was some directors in rural areas — like the one near Okanagan Falls — didn’t feel they were getting enough opportunities to communicate directly with their constituents.

So, when a giant opportunity emerges in the form of a wildfire-stoked mushroom cloud on a July afternoon, we expect better.