Evacuation orders and alerts have been issued for a handful of properties in the Hixon community of the Hixon center-northern, just south of Prince George, due to a close forest fire discovered on Friday.
The Regional District of Fraser-Fort George issued orders and alerts at 9:45 PM PT on Friday, with five rural properties in the order of evacuation and another five on alert.
The orders occur when the fire activity is carried out in the province in the middle of a dry spring, particularly for the northeast section of the province, where the cell and internet service was temporarily cut in some areas on Friday.
Karley Desrosiers, an information officer for the BC forest fire service, said that Naver Creek’s forest fire, just northwest of Hixon, was discovered on Friday afternoon, and air tankers were helping to fight him.
“Fortunately, they rain a little, not a lot, but helped reduce the behavior of fire enough for the crews to progress,” News told CBC on Saturday morning. “And there was no significant growth during the night.”
Little less than 40 forest fires were burning in BC from 11 am PT on Saturday. Naver Creek’s forest fire was burning over an area of 70 hectares, approximately 54 kilometers south of Prince George.
Drosiers said the fire was throwing large amounts of smoke near the 97 highway, although he said the forecasts showed that the forest fire should not affect the road.
“However, there could be strong winding winds this afternoon when this cold front passes through the province,” added the information officer.
“Therefore, still some unpredictability in terms of climate, but colder temperatures today, which will also help reduce fire behavior in general.”
An evacuation order means that residents must go immediately, while an evacuation alert means that residents must prepare to leave their homes with little or no notification.
DESOSIERS said that orders and alerts for the hyxon area largely cover rural properties, and were issued as a precautionary measure, not due to an imminent threat to homes.
“With unpredictable and sporadic winds, we wanted to err next to the caution there, in case this fire increased or growing overnight,” he said.
“Fortunately, with that small amount of precipitation, that was not the case and work continues with containment.”
Other fires in the northeastern
On Friday, the BC forest fire service warned about unusually dry conditions throughout the province.
According to its Saturday morning board, most of the fires that burn in BC are as a result of human activity, a wide category of fires that refers to any fire not caused by lightning.
Drosiers said that most spring fires are generally caused by human activity, and urged anyone in the field this weekend not to park off -road vehicles in places with long and dry grass.
Unusually warm temperatures and dry conditions have led to BC forest fire service to issue an open burning warning for parts of the province that experience an early taste of summer. This alert follows the appearance of several un controlled forest fires, as reported by Michelle Morton of CBC.
“We strongly encourage people to avoid making any burning open in a weekend like this, where we have these strong winds and climatic conditions very, very dry,” said the information officer on Saturday.
“Temperatures reached 27 C yesterday in certain areas of the Prince George Fire Center, which is considerably higher than we would expect for this time of the year.”
DESOSIERS added that the teams continued to make good progress in other forest fires in the Northeast, including a just north of Fort St. John that caused evacuation orders on Thursday.
Since then, those orders have been called, and the Internet and cell service have also been restored to Tumbler Ridge after a forest fire just to the southwest of that community.
“In general, we saw a significant reduction in the fire activity in all areas at the Fire Center of Prince George last night, and we will closely monitor those winds for a potential increase in fire activity later,” said DesroSiers.
