File Photo (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By Pete McIntyre / Vernon Matters

BC Wildfire

Mother Nature gets credit for 1,300 fewer fires this summer

Aug 27, 2019 | 11:29 AM

VERNON, B.C. — Nobody is complaining, but the numbers are almost unbelievable.

The B.C. Wildfire Service said there have been about 1,300 fewer wildfires in the province so far this year, compared to one year ago.

“To date, we’ve had 688 fires across the province, and we’ve only seen just over 21,000 hectares burned which is down quite a bit from the last couple of years. Last year (on this date), there were just under 2,000 fires across the province and just under one million hectares burned, so quite a difference between the two years,” Provincial Information Officer Hannah Swift said.

Swift said when you look at the 10-year average, this year isn’t that far behind.

“We’re about equal to the amount of fires on average over the 10 years, and average hectares burned is just over 54,000,” she added.

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So why the big difference between this year and last?

Swift says it comes down to the rain.

“It was just really the frequency of the rain we got throughout the summer. It’s not that we got a significant amount of rain in the southern part of the province, but we did get it kind of weekly, so there weren’t long enough drying periods in between the rains where the fuel could get dry enough.”

Swift said that’s also why there has been fewer lightning-caused fires.

“That’s not to say there was less lightning this year, it just came through with more moisture and precipitation and so they didn’t actually spark any fires,” she said.

There has been 138 fires this season (since April) in the Kamloops Fire Centre (KFC), burning 4,059 hectares.

There are currently 35 active fires in B.C., including three in the Kamloops Fire Centre.

“The fire danger is quite low across the province. It is still dry in the South and there’s not a whole lot of precipitation forecasted, so it is kind of seasonal averages there, but we did see some rainfalls over the past couple weeks that have helped quite significantly,” Swift added.