Telegraph Creek fire destroys 27 structures

Wildfires have destroyed 27 structures in the Telegraph Creek area, representing 30 to 45 per cent of buildings in the small northwestern British Columbia community, says a local First Nation chief.

Tahltan Band Chief Rick McLean said in a video posted to Facebook on Tuesday that the town has sustained significant damage, but fortunately no lives have been lost.

They don’t know yet which structures were destroyed, McLean said in the video recorded at a community hall on Tuesday morning and posted to a Facebook group created to distribute information about the wildfires.

More than 460 wildfires are burning across the province and B.C. Wildfire Service spokeswoman Kyla Fraser said soaring temperatures have replaced lightning strikes as the new challenge.

About 50 fires are burning in northwestern B.C., including the 78-square kilometre fire that has forced the evacuation of Telegraph Creek and cut Highway 51 to Dease Lake. Fraser said the blaze had destroyed some structures, but she couldn’t confirm the 27 figure.

Nearly 80 firefighters, nine helicopters and 15 pieces of heavy equipment are working on that fire alone, she said.

Lightning storms have abated after sparking hundreds of new wildfires in B.C. last week, but Fraser warned a renewed hot spell means no relief for firefighters.

Environment Canada issued heat warnings and special weather statements for large parts of B.C. on Tuesday.

Conditions were not due to ease until Friday or Saturday, when the weather office said showers and cooling temperatures were likely.

The wildfire service currently lists the fire danger rating as high to extreme across much of the province, with most of northwestern B.C. and the inner south coast, including Vancouver Island, ranked as extremely dry.

“We are expecting not so many new starts (because) we are over the worst of that lightning activity, but as the temperatures continue to increase we are expecting to see some increased activity on the fires that are currently burning,” Fraser said.

An out-of-control blaze in a rural area of Vancouver Island, southwest of Nanaimo, prompted the Regional District of Nanaimo to declare a state of local emergency Monday night.

The nearly 1.5-square kilometre fire in the Nanaimo Lakes area broke out Sunday and grew aggressively Monday, forcing the evacuation of homes on its west flank and evacuation alerts for 77 properties on the east side.

With the evacuations on Vancouver Island, fires of concern are now burning in all six of B.C.’s regional fire centres.

In southeastern B.C., a 12-square kilometre blaze in Kootenay National Park has caused sporadic closures of Highway 93 and is being managed by Parks Canada and provincial wildfire staff.

Crews were making some progress containing a 120-square kilometre fire that forced evacuation of a wilderness lodge south of Princeton last week and the fire was 40 per cent contained on Tuesday, the wildfire service said.

Forests Minister Doug Donaldson plans to speak with the finance minister about the annual wildfire budget and whether it needs to be revised, considering the increased number of wildfires the province has experienced in recent years, a spokeswoman said.

The budget for the 2018 wildfire season was $63 million, but $131 million has been spent to date.