Both air and water quality will suffer
‘Apocalyptic’ conditions put athletes at risk
Heavy smoke and poor air quality due to wildfires burning throughout the province forced the cancellation of two triathlons in the Central Okanagan region Sunday.
The remaining races for both the Super League Triathlon in Penticton and the Kelowna Apple Triathlon were scrapped, and while athletes were disappointed by the last-minute cancellations, two racers from B.C. have come out on top.
As racers could not ride, swim and run on Sunday, Penticton Super League organizer Darren Hailes said the top 10 male and female professional triathletes racing in Penticton would be graced spots in the first round of the world championship series being held in Jersey, U.K., in late September.
That’s welcome news for Nathan Killam and Rachel McBride, two B.C. pros who will now have the chance to race in the world championship series.
Killam, 32, a professional triathlete from Vancouver, has an uncommon perspective on the calamity that forced his race to be cancelled — a perspective gained from spending the past nine years as a firefighter in Delta.
“These conditions are nothing compared to what all the first responders and citizens are dealing with, who are coming from these evacuation zones,” Killam said in a phone interview Sunday from a hotel in Penticton, the race’s planned finish line.
Killam, who still works as a firefighter, said he arrived in the Okanagan last Thursday and immediately noticed how bad the air quality was, saying it was “two or three times worse than in Vancouver.”
Hailes said that, while both athletes and organizers were disappointed to abandon the race, they were still able to celebrate on Sunday.
About an hour’s drive north in Kelowna, Matt Canzer, the board chair of the Kelowna Apple Triathlon Society, said his view of the course early Sunday was like the stuff of nightmares.
“To be honest, early in the morning it looks apocalyptic. It’s a sad sight to see,” he said.
Triathlon Canada CEO Kim Van Bruggen said the safety of the athletes and coaches is her organization’s top priority, and she thanked the directors of the Apple Triathlon for their support.
Environment Canada rated the air quality as “very high risk” for the Central Okanagan on Sunday, with the region scoring over 10 on its index.
Dr. Trevor Corneil, the chief medical officer for Interior Health, the Okanagan’s provincial health care coordinator, said even professional triathletes could struggle if particulate entered the lungs and blood stream.
“Elite athletes will face difficulties breathing, some early exhaustion, and in extreme cases if they ’re also dehydrated, they may experience confusion from difficulty breathing the air,” said Corneil.
New evacuation orders were issued on the weekend for parts of north-central B.C. being battered by wildfires, while residents of the region hope for more wind to clear out the smoke.
The Regional District of Bulkley-Nechako issued new or expanded evacuation orders for three remote areas on Saturday, bringing the total number of evacuation orders in the region to nine — the most in B.C.
Wildfires burning near the Nadina, Shovel and Tesla lakes in the Bulkley-Nechako region are the largest in the province, and have grown to more than 1,600 square kilometres combined.
Meanwhile, many residents of Kimberley have been on an evacuation alert since Thursday as smoke continues to descend on the East Kootenay region.
Sanford Brown with the Emergency Operations Centre in Cranbrook, about 30 minutes south of Kimberley, said he’s seen the community act quickly to prepare themselves for the worst.
Brown said residents in any area under evacuation alerts or orders need to take it upon themselves to be prepared, making sure they’re getting correct information from trusted sources and are ready to leave immediately.
“Don’t let your guard down, don’t think it couldn’t change, and the more you’re prepared, the less anxious you’ll be,” he said.
“We’ve had 87 people register into the reception centre, and we’ve had a really good response form the community supporting those people with offers of help and resources,” Brown said over the phone from Cranbrook.
Brown said while the wind activity that fed the fires outside the city had calmed, the smoke was still heavy in that corner of the province.
“It seems like there’s fires all around us, so if it’s not our fires smoking us out, its somebody else’s,” he said.
The B.C. Wildfire Service’s Carlee Kachman said the agency had just received the results of an aerial reconnaissance of the fire threatening Kimberley, as winds from the north had pushed the fire in on itself.
“We’re very pleased about that report,” said Kachman.
It seems like there’s fires all around us, so if it’s not our fires smoking us out, its somebody else’s.