BC Wildfire Update, Aug 3, 2021
so welcome to today's operational information update on the current wildfire situation in bc for today's briefing we'll have updates from rob schweitzer director of fire off center operations bc wildfire service brendan ralph director of response emergency management bc don roberts rcmp spokesperson and dr bonnie henry provincial health officer a reminder to media on the line please press star one to enter the queue you will be limited to one question and one follow-up with that i'll turn it over to rob schweitzer director of fire center operations bc wildfire service good day i'd like just to provide a brief update on the current virus status and and talk about some of the challenges and successes that we've had over the past few days so since the start of the season the bc wildfire service has responded to about 1312 wildfires and that's resulted in just over 556 000 hectares of area burned there's currently 249 active wildfires burning in bc 34 of those are wildfires of note so 173 of these are due to natural causes and 17 of them are due to human-caused fires the 10-year average for this time of year is 760 fires for a total of about 114 000 hectares burned i'm really pleased to report it's been a week of steady progress and over the past seven days the average number of new fires per day has remained at around below seven and the total number of fires burning at any one time has remained below 250. visibility remains a challenge due to wildfire smoke and has been hampering our aviation operations the safety of our staff is always the number one priority and we need to follow transport canada regulations when we're flying and even with those visibility challenges we've flown over 4 000 hours with our air tanker fleet and over 23 000 hours with our helicopters the rain received over the weekend has curbed the fire behavior but not enough to make any for only for a short period of time allowing our crews to make you know progress on those incidents however the amount of rain was not enough to make any long-term impact and we'll see return to those extremely dry conditions to the southern interior today and tomorrow and conditions for the rest of the week remain variable across the province it's only early august and there's still a significant amount of fire in the landscape everyone needs to remain diligent i'd like to take a moment to thank all british colombians for their diligence and their caution the vast majority of new starts over the long weekend were due to natural causes of the very small handful of human-caused wildfires all have been declared out they're under control or they're being held i just wanted to send out a reminder to everyone that all bc wildfire service personnel and contractors are provided with personal protective equipment this is related to their jobs and all the kobe 19 related supplies personnel adhere to these cobed public health orders and guidelines to ensure that operations can continue safely throughout the province in indoor areas all personnel are required to physically distance wear masks and sanitize and this is a requirement that that that's necessary products are for all the sorry all as this is a requirement all necessary products are provided including mass so be wary of any online requests of the nature that are unsolicited by the bc wildfire service and any donation made cannot be accepted we appreciate your understanding and support and so far the 2020 season has been very busy one for our crews and if you're looking for a way to actively support our careers and personnel we encourage you to post a sign thanking them for their work so thank you our next update will be from brendan rouse director of response with emergency management bc hey good afternoon everyone sweet emergency management bc want to acknowledge the impacts this wildfire season has had on british columbians we know that people lost their homes we know that at current count we have over 4500 properties on evacuation order and over 21 000 on evacuation alert some of them for protracted lengths of time we know that businesses have have been impacted and all across british columbia people are feeling the impacts of wildfire smoke i just want to let you know that we're working in partnership with the bc wildfire service with other provincial ministries with other emergency management partners and critically with first nations and local authorities to ensure that british columbians are provided the supports that they need to make it through this challenging time thank you thank you our next update will be from dr bonnie henry provincial health officer thank you very much and it is my privilege to be speaking to you today from the traditional and unseated territories of the le combine speaking people now known as the sangies and espy malt first nations and i wanted to bring up two things today one is as was mentioned where the effects of wildfire smoke both from fires here in bc but also from our neighbors to the south in washington state have been affecting many different areas of the province right now and just to remind people uh virus can exacerbate some chronic conditions that people have smoky air makes it harder for your lungs to get oxygen into your blood and can cause irritation to the respiratory system and also can lead to inflammation which can cause um other symptoms for people so the things to look out for are eye irritation runny nose sore throat mild cough and and feeling like you have phlegm in your throat wheezy breathing and headaches these are very common and usually can be managed on their own but for some people they can have more severe symptoms like shortness of breath severe cough dizziness chest pain heart palpitations or heart racing if you have those conditions particularly if you're somebody with a history of lung or heart problems then you should seek medical attention whether that's calling 811 whether that's talking to your health care provider or if you are experiencing extreme short of breath calling 9-1-1 we know that different people respond differently to wildfire smoke and some people are higher risk and those people are particularly people whose health is compromised by such things as asthma or copd chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and people with conditions such as heart disease diabetes cancer and mental illness are also at increased risk as are pregnant women and people caring for infants and you need to the best thing that we can do is to prevent exposure to wildfire smoke which means not going outside if possible keeping windows closed having filters in your forced airfield hepa filtration in your home if that's possible or staying with a neighbor or friend or visiting libraries community centers shopping malls and other places that have cleaner air i know at this time is challenging because we've also had heat along with the wildfire smoke and we do need to pay attention to heat because it can be deadly as we've known across this past weekend as well so it is important for people to take precautions for to protect one another from heat and from wildfire smoke and if you're somebody who's not affected by wildfire smoke so much make sure you check on your family and friends and baby and finally i just want to um you know this is an important part in our place in our covid uh 19 immunization program tomorrow is walk-in wednesday and we know that many people who've been displaced because of the wildfires because of the issues that we've had across the province may not have had the opportunity to get their second dose or to get their first dose and tomorrow's an opportunity across the province for people to walk in and get those important vaccines that will protect you from covert 19 as we've seen a surge in cases particularly in the interior and will also protect those around you so i recommend everybody who hasn't had that opportunity tomorrow is walk in wednesday there'll be opportunities all across the province for people to get caught up on their vaccines thank you and that concludes the operational updates for today a reminder to media on the line to please press star one to enter the queue you will be limited to one question and one follow-up our first question today is from jones rise and picton herald please go ahead thank you my question is for the uh gentleman from the wildfire service forgiving i forgot your name um what what's the pro what's the prognosis here are these these fires ever going to be put out or is it just going to nature's going to take its course or what what are you what's the future hold for the public here thank you so there will be some of the fires that are burning in more remote areas difficult terrain and where there's less values at risk that will burn until the fall and even until the snow snow comes but our focus obviously remains on those front country fires those ones that are impacting are potentially impacting communities major infrastructure and then other values like range and forage grasslands trees and and other uh indigenous uh values on the landscape we remain focused on those and that's where our resources are currently focused on um again we saw a bit of a reprieve with the cooler temperatures and a bit of precipitation this weekend but um i i guess in my message at the start i mean i don't want anybody to be lulled into uh the season's over it is only august third and uh and there's a lot of summer left so our our focus will remain on those fires um again if we still if we continue to see the downtrend and new starts we'll be able to keep our resources focused on those existing fires rather than having to pull them away to new starts um and uh and so yeah that's going to remain our focus um to make sure that we we're we're tackling those uh those incidents that are uh that have the most impact um potentially on communities and other values and and some of those more back country fires will likely [Music] remain burning until the snow until the winter so did you have a follow-up sure please and uh forgive me for being specific but there's thomas creek and the incubate creek fires in our coverage area so those ones are obviously very visible front country fires what's the prognosis for two fires like that are they are they going to be waiting until the winter comes or if things work out can you put them out before then or how soon yeah so obviously i can't predict and and you realize that i can't i can't provide a date um obviously those are uh some of our priority fires as you mentioned uh because of their proximity to communities um and we we uh we continue to have resources on those fires because of that um our tactics will obviously um you know in those specific cases for those two fires will will remain focused on protection of the community and then outwards from the community into more the the crown land and where the timber is and um and usually what our tactics are in big fires like that is is you know once once the fire's moved away from the immediate threat of the community we'll continue to build machine guard around the perimeter of the fire flanking the fire and then uh removing the fuel uh between the guard uh and where the fire is so that it actually burns itself out in some cases uh and then we just keep working into that center of the fire um but even this weekend we were able to and i don't know about thomas and any particularly but on a lot of those big fires we're able to get guards in places where it was too dangerous to go because of the fire behavior when it was uh much warmer and the relative humidities were much lower um so we were able to make some good progress but but those um you know if for me to predict the exact date would be would be foolish however those do remain a priority for us and we'll continue to see uh crews working on those as long as they're a threat to to the communities in the south okanagan our next question today is from syndrome alexander ctv news please go ahead uh hi dr henry uh we just looked at new york and they are now requiring people to be vaccinated to go to restaurants and to uh or proof of vaccinations i should say in restaurants and gyms is this something we should do in bc uh when you look at the numbers surging yeah so there's a number of different things that we we have in our communities as you know and we do recommend that people um take precautions and that particularly if you're not immunized uh those settings are more dangerous but we're not at this point going to be requiring people there are some businesses there's some groups that are are um making up that are making requirements that i think are perfectly valid for their own situations where they have required that only people who are immunized are allowed to to attend we've talked about not having vaccine passports for things like access to public services but there are some things that are not essential services where it is important that only immunized people get together especially if it's in a situation where we have more of the virus transmitted and in settings like indoor crowded settings did you have a follow-up i do thank you which leads me dr henry to of course the school year it's fast approaching september um a lot of them under 12 of course and most of them have not had a vaccine a vaccine um i know you established plans earlier in light of all this are we going to be changing are you have plans to change the uh your plans for the school year yeah and currently we don't and obviously we're continuing to work with our provincial committee on on what are the things that we need to have in place to make the school year as normal as possible for children we know how challenging this past couple of years was past school year was particularly how important it was for school families in the school community for children to have in school learnings and we are committed to that again this year we want to make sure that as many of those who are eligible to be immunized particularly teachers and school staff and older students are immunized that is really important in the school setting but we also know that the school setting is not a high risk environment for transmission of food and what we see in the schools reflects what's going on in the community that's why it's so important for all of us to be immunized everybody who's eligible and as i mentioned tomorrow is our walk-in wednesday around the province now is the time where people who have just not been able to have had challenges booking appointments or have questions can go into clinics across the province and get your vaccine get your questions answered step up for yourself to protect yourself but also to protect those around you my next question is from gordon mcintyre post media please go ahead dr henry um if the lambda variant appeared in bc and and um what do we know about it what makes it so infectious and impossibly resistant to vaccines yeah i've not heard that there's concerns about resistance to vaccines most of the variants of pattern and it's not been labeled that yet it's a variant of interest are ones that transmit more easily between people and yes we are watching it i can't tell you off the top of my head if we i believe we've seen one or two i haven't seen the latest on our whole genome sequencing that we've been doing on all of our cases here in bc but the same things apply we know that getting a high level of vaccination protects us from all of the strains that are circulating right now um we know i presented the data last week that the vast majority of people who are getting sick with kovid right now have not been immunized and we think about the people who are in hospital the people who are in icu the vast majority of them less than less than four percent of the cases that we've had in the last um two months have been in people who have been vaccinated so we know vaccine works it protects people and that's what we need to focus on right now thank you according to the follow up just i guess so there's nothing extra to fear about about this variant sorry yeah that these it's another one of the variants we know that the same measures that we take to prevent transmission work against all of the variants um including delta which is the one that we're seeing circulating quite frequently right now we're still seeing a lot of the uh the gamma as well and a little bit of alpha and a a smattering of a number of others but the measures are the same it's keeping sick people away from well people so that they can transmit it and it's all of us being protected from the virus by being immunized okay thank you our next question is from nelson bennett business in vancouver please go ahead yeah i just wanted to ask about the uh our capacity for fire uh wildfire fighting and and just to try and find out whether it's sufficient um i'm reading on the wild uh fire service website that we have access to uh 20 air tankers and 10 amphibious air tanker yeah air tankers and then a variety of helicopters i'm just wondering number one if that's if those are all deployed right now and number two whether that's sufficient or given you know the the long-term trend seems to be increased severity and and scale of wildfires do we have uh sufficient capacity going forward or will we need to try to access more uh this kind of equipment yeah so currently right now in bc we have uh just over 3 300 personnel engaged in the in the response efforts and and as you mentioned uh 211 of those are aircraft and so the last time i think i heard was about the you know about 170 helicopters and the rest are our fixed-wing fleet or air tanker fleet as as you alluded to um okay yeah so we've we've had good success in the last few weeks in in in seeing some of that support that international support and the national support so we have uh alberta supporting us here uh quebec was here and and i believe they've returned now on days of rest um we have a parks canada team and staff here and then obviously as we've alluded to in the past we have uh a contingency of mexicans the military as well as um the australians and so in regards to so in regards to to uh aviation resources um we did bring in more this year uh as the fire season uh progressed because of the obviously we forecasted the need and uh you know we have uh solicited and under contract i believe every available helicopter in the province of bc and then you know kind of eastwards uh you know in competition with the with the other uh provinces that are quite busy right now so we're always juggling and keeping our eye out for uh finding additional resources especially when it comes to aviation resources or aerial resources um and and we do that on the off season as well we we obviously always look at our our allotment and and determine uh you know based on um history based on trends what sort of resourcing we're going to need moving into the to the you know to the following season um we work closely with our international agencies and partners you know in the off season to make sure that we're aligned and ready to go if if there is a season and the biggest challenge this year as we've been speaking about is the fire season kind of hit all across uh canada and western north america at the same time and then covet impacted our ability to access the australians out of their country um as soon as we would have liked so yeah we're always reassessing our needs but right now um you know we feel that we've employed you know a lot of or all the available resources in the british club in british columbia we've worked closely with communities and really the forest industry as well they've they've stepped up a significant amount so the the big companies and the small contractors in the province to help us out okay just to follow up with me yeah please um i'm just wondering if there i understand there are technologies after that can improve uh predictions uh detection and that sort of thing i'm just wondering if we're using them all or whether there are technologies that we perhaps should be adopting satellite imaging for example for earlier detection in order to respond quicker are there technologies available that we're not using yet that we perhaps should be adopting yeah so coming out of the 2017 and 18 wildfire season part of the recommendations in the avid chapman review were around the use of technology i'm really pleased to say that the bc wildfire service we we took it upon ourselves to develop a a program within our own uh organization called the predictive services unit and it it continues to look at new technology new tools uh to help us forecast um fire uh model bar growth and in around the detection uh piece as well so we do everything from obviously we get reports in through our 1 800 center the public reporting new fires to having fixed wing aerial patrols on a regular basis to using remote sensing as you alluded to to not only help us with detection but help us with fire growth and trying to forecast where where the where an existing fire may may move to in the future days to help warn people ahead of those fires we use that technology um to obviously work with embc and local governments to help uh form the recommendations around evacuation orders and alerts could we be doing more i think um i think with you know with our with that program in place and some of the work we're doing around the technology we're going to continue to look at that we've also established a research and innovation division that focuses solely on on this sort of area with the vending community technology changes so quickly that it's hard to say that we we always have the greatest and newest and the best but we've uh i firmly believe that we've increased in that our capacity in that area quite a bit and we will continue to do so um this is uh given the conditions that we're seeing uh with fire and fire in the landscape now we need to be able to utilize those sort of resources and tools to uh to protect uh property and the values at risk in british columbia okay thank you thank you everyone this concludes today's information update our next scheduled update is set for thursday afternoon at 2pm thank you everyone for joining
2021-08-08 13:00
