A second round of local firefighters have been deployed to Ontario.
Three further initial attack crews are joining other B.C. fire crew personnel in helping to extinguish a number of growing fires in the Dryden and Thunder Bay areas of Ontario.
The three person initial attack crews from Burns Lake, Telkwa and Terrace left for Ontario, July 20.
There’s also one person from Terrace, one from the Nadina forest district and one from the Kalum forest district heading there too.
The latter two are from the Northwest Fire Centre’s temporary emergency assignment management system, who hold government jobs in forestry, outside of the Wildfire Management Branch.
Previously two 20 person unit crews from Burns Lake and Telkwa flew to Ontario July 16, along with two initial attack crews from Burns Lake and Terrace. They’re expected to be there for between 14 to 19 days.
Lindsay Carnes, the Northwest Fire Centre’s information officer said to Lakes District News that locals, Rob Krause and Cliff Manning are part of the crews sent to Ontario.
“Rob is the type one fire crew team manager,” she said.
According to Carnes, there is now 27 firefighters from Burns Lake in Ontario.
The Ontario Forest Fire Management Centre say there are currently 111 active fires burning across the province. These fires have consumed more than 400,000 hectares of land.
Krause’s type one fire team is currently working on a cluster of fires near Sandy Lake.
One initial attack crew still remains in Burns Lake and two 20 person unit crews from Hazelton and Terrace are also left behind to cover the Northwest, along with three initial attack crews.
Carnes said the weather outlook continues to predict cool, wet weather with no warming and drying trend on the horizon. She also pointed out that the Northwest Fire Centre is well under the number of fire starts on average for this time of year, adding that there has not been a fire since June 22 in the Northwest zone.
“It is slow this year,” she said.
With files from Kat Lee
