Out-of-province firefighters arriving to help battle B.C. blazes
Alberta fire behaviour analyst Clifton McKay has come to B.C. three times to help fight wildfires, but this time, it’s personal.
McKay grew up west of Williams Lake and he still has family in the area, including his parents. Over the weekend, the growing Hanceville fires, which now cover 100 square kilometres, forced his family to be evacuated.
“My parents’ place was burnt over by one of the fires,” said McKay, who arrived in Kamloops with more than 90 other firefighters and support staff on Monday. “My dad is actually still out there. He managed to save the house, but the rest of the place got burned.”
McKay said his family has had only sporadic contact with his dad over the past few days through a device he uses to send a satellite signal and show that he’s all right.
“It is tough,” he said. “I actually took some time (Monday) night and spent it with my family here in town, just making sure they’re all OK. That helps me to sort of set it aside and get out here and do my job the best I can and get a handle on this fire.”
As a fire behaviour analyst, McKay’s job is to predict where fire will spread, deal with wildfire safety and tell firefighters where it’s safe to go to fight the fire.
“We’re just glad to come here to help,” he said. “We want to return the favour that B.C. did when they came and helped us in our time of need last spring.”
There are about 1,600 B.C. firefighters and support staff dealing with the more than 200 wildfires burning in B.C.’s Interior. There is little relief in sight, with continued hot weather, wind and lightning predicted for the rest of this week.
Kevin Skrepnek, chief fire information officer at the Provincial Wildfire Coordination Centre in Kamloops, said that about 300 personnel were expected to arrive in Kamloops and Prince George from out of province by Wednesday. This includes firefighters and support staff.
Most of them were coming from Alberta and Ontario, with others from Saskatchewan and New Brunswick. Parks Canada is also providing a dozen firefighters.
Another dozen firefighters are expected to arrive in Prince George from Manitoba later this week.
Leslie Lozinski, Alberta forest information officer, said 92 people arrived from Alberta on Monday, including 60 firefighters, an incident management team, investigators, air attack officers and pilots. The province is also contributing aircraft, including water bombers and “bird-dog” aircraft that coordinate tankers from the air.
She said all of her firefighters are well trained to deal with fires in any province.
“There’s been large, complex fires on the landscape in different provinces across the years. We’re prepared and we’re ready to do our job as soon as we get to the fire,” she said.
Lozinski expected the crews to be deployed by Wednesday and they will stay in the area for about two weeks before heading home. Whether more firefighters from Alberta will replace them remains to be seen, she said.
Requests for out-of-province assistance are made through the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, which co-ordinates the sharing of firefighting resources within Canada. Under mutual aidresource sharing agreements, B.C. will pay for the help it’s requested.
The B.C. Wildfire Service also has arrangements with companies from across the province to provide contract firefighters and support staff. As of July 11, the service had more than 200 contract personnel working on wildfires.