Worst likely over, but expert says ‘this is the new reality’
The worst of this year’s wildfire season is likely over, but some experts say burning forests and smoky skies could be the new reality in B.C. for summers to come.
In his daily media briefing Thursday afternoon, B.C. Wildfire Service chief fire information officer Kevin Skrepnek said it was “probably safe to say the worst is over,” although several large fires were still burning across the province and more than 1,000 properties remained under evacuation orders.
Cooler weather was expected to help with fire suppression and prevention moving into the fall and winter months, which meant the number of active fires was expected to gradually decrease through September.
But University of Alberta wildfire expert Mike Flannigan said the reprieve may be temporary.
“The climate is changing and this is the new reality,” he told Postmedia News.
“We’ve been predicting more fire in B.C., but we weren’t expecting this much, this soon.”
Flannigan noted that more land has burned in the last two years than in the previous 25 years in B.C.
“We might not see this every year, but we’re predicting that we’ll see more years with more fire activity,” he said.
On Wednesday, B.C. extended the provincewide state of emergency for two more weeks as the total area of land burned by wildfires crept past last year’s record.
There have been 2,015 fires recorded so far this summer, which is more than last year’s total of 1,353. As of Thursday, 12,810 square kilometres had been scorched.
Officials were quick to point out that while the total amount of land burned by fires was significant, the “human impact” had been less than previous years.
But no matter how you measured the impact, this year seemed to fall in line with a discouraging trend of worsening wildfires, said Flannigan.
He blamed a blocking ridge of high pressure for creating the perfect conditions for disaster. The air beneath the ridge, which has been stuck over B.C. and the Western U.S. for much of this summer and last, “sinks, dries and warms.” That, in turn, dries the forests that fuel the fire. “The table is set,” said the professor. A lightning strike or human error ignites the inferno.
Flannigan said research predicts the blocking ridge will become more common as the Arctic ice melts and the jet stream becomes “lazy” and stalls over the West Coast.
He pointed to several other factors that have contributed to the situation, including a lack of controlled burning and more development in what used to be wild lands.
The government has promised to look at controlled burning and is in the process of implementing the recommendations made in an independent review of the 2017 wildfire and flood seasons.
“Even before last year, it was becoming pretty clear that we were dealing with a longer season, not just in terms of burning season … we have to have people starting earlier for training, for prescribed burns and that sort of thing,” Skrepnek said Wednesday. “We do have the report out of last season … we have a lot of recommendations from that that we’re already moving on.
“We need to start looking at how we prepare … and what can communities do with the fuel situation around them.”