COLLINS: You should be afraid as wildfire season starts
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UNLESS YOU’VE BEEN AN OSTRICH with your head in the sand, you will be well aware that the wildfire season is already upon us. Several fires have sprung up in the Merritt and Lillooet areas, while further north, Fort Nelson is under attack, and in Alberta, Fort McMurray, devastated a few years ago, may soon be under attack again.
And while governments at all levels have been much more proactive in the past year, no one is really ready for what could be the worst wildfire season in history. Nature has not recovered from last year’s drought, and it will be much worse this year. Snowpacks are at record low levels and that means the underbrush will be drier than ever. Getting water and retardant to fight the big fires will be a major challenge.
Dealing with interface fires could mean the shutting down of sprinkling, lawn watering and even drinking water. If the reservoirs are being depleted by fighting a wildfire, we have to shut down part of the system until the reservoir levels return to normal.
While we are building new centres to properly coordinate resources, we aren’t far enough along for them to be of maximum benefit this year. We need to hire more firefighters and make better use of local area firefighters and Indigenous teams that can help quickly.
