Juniper East wildfire on July 1, 2021 (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By Chad Klassen

JUNIPER EAST FIRE

Reflecting on lessons learned from Juniper East wildfire a year ago

Jun 30, 2022 | 4:48 PM

KAMLOOPS — Dan Baudin remembers the Juniper East wildfire like it was yesterday. Only a year has passed, but he vividly remembers the lightning strike on the evening of Canada Day and could sense a big fire was coming his way.

“It was 15 minutes later when we evacuated, and the fire was already over the two hills, so it was two mountain hills here on the other side. It was already right here coming down this top one at us, and we knew there was probably no hope.”

But thanks to Kamloops Fire Rescue and the BC Wildfire Service, Baudin’s property and others in Valleyview and Juniper went untouched.

KFR says from a firefighting perspective, the response went as well as it could have. Acting chief Ryan Cail says the breakdown was in communication.

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“Very common to a lot of [emergencies], one of the things we realized we could improve on was communication within,” said Cail. “Our unified commands with agencies like the BC Wildfire Service gave us a really good opportunity to grow the relationship and go forward talking the same language.”

Cail says with the new Voyent Alert that will inform Kamloops residents of an emergency, communication should be improve in the case of another such fire.

“Any kind of emergency puts people in a very vulnerable situation. We empathize with that. We try and intervene in those situations and offer the suggestions like things like a tactical evacuation, so the Voyent app will definitely help with that,” said Cail. “And we highly urge residents to pay attention to those alerts.”

The aftermath of the Juniper East fire put pressure on the city to develop alternative routes out of Juniper. Three emergency exits have been developed and paved, so residents will have a secondary exit in case of another fire.

There are now three emergency exits available in Juniper with a permanent route coming in the next couple years (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

However, the permanent $2.5 million second exit on Qu’Appelle Boulevard is running into some roadblocks with the province.

“We’ve got applications in to do exploratory work. We don’t have the approvals for that yet, but we’d like to get on there and do archaeological work, we’d like to do geotechnical investigations,” said Kwiatkowski. “So obviously that project’s not going to be completed or happen this year, but hopefully in a year or two.”

For Baudin, he’s thankful for the firefighting personnel, who helped save his home. Entering this fire season, he’s tried to clean up some of the fuels around his property, but still isn’t too worried.

“With a heatwave like that, obviously that can be a reoccurence, depending on the conditions of the year, but it’s mainly the undergrowth and the vegetation, and we don’t have that here because it’s burnt down,” said Baudin. “So I’m much more relaxed after the fire happened because all that underbrush got burnt up.”