A wildfire burning outside of Drayton Valley, Alberta, about 105 kilometers southwest of Edmonton, on May 4, 2023. (Lethbridge News Now)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

dry times

Coastal Fire Centre sending resources around B.C. and Alberta as wildfires rage

May 9, 2023 | 3:29 PM

NANAIMO — Firefighters from the Coastal Fire Centre are being deployed to help with hot spots across western Canada.

Information officer Marg Drysdale said over two dozen of their firefighters have been deployed to Prince George to help local crews in northeastern B.C. and neighbouring Alberta.

“This is all firefighter crew personnel. There are a couple of single resources that have been sent as part of an incident management team to Alberta. We anticipate there may be more requests coming through but at this point, we have 28 personnel in Prince George.”

Drysdale said once members are deployed to other regions, they will be organized and sent off to where they are needed most.

“There’s four initial attack crews, and we do have 12 members of a unit crew that are going. Unit crew members are generally working on larger project fires, they are likely going to the bigger fires. Initial attack crews may be doing some of the smaller fires or they may combine them and turn them into a small unit group.”

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Crews are deployed for their regular 14-day stretches, often working 12-14 hour days in tough conditions, digging ditches and trudging through uneven terrain.

Drysdale said sometimes they go even longer, depending on the severity of the situation.

“It’s hard, gruelling work, so we’re very proud that they are going up and they’ll be working on multiple fires with other B.C. Wildfire Service personnel.”

She said despite having a focus on the Coastal Fire Centre, they are a provincial organization and will go where they are needed.

As of Tuesday morning, there were no wildfires burning on Vancouver Island, and only two in the Coastal Fire Centre, located southeast of Powell River which are marked as under control.

With no precipitation in the immediate forecast for Nanaimo, Drysdale is doing what wildfire operations do all season long: watch the weather forecast and hope for the best.

“This coming weekend we’re looking at some drying going on, and it’s very hard for forecasters to look longer than three to four days out, but what they’re seeing is a trend towards drying by next Friday, so we’re looking at some warmer temperatures by next weekend.”

Dry conditions have plagued most of Vancouver Island since last fall, as fire centres prepare for possible worst-case wildfire scenarios.

The Coastal Fire Centre encompasses the central and south coast of B.C. including all of Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii.

– with files from Jon de Roo, 97.3 The Eagle

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