July 24: no action on the Tentfire Creek fire, but the hook creek fire out at Monkman is now estimated at 258 ha. And—as mentioned previously—is visible from the river.
July 23: again, no real new info, save the crew, which now stands at 20 firefighters, 2 helicopters And 8 pieces of heavy equipment.
July 21: Midnight. No real changes, but a few additional facts tossed in to give the story a bit more flavour.
July 20, 12:00 Just got an email from BC Wildfire Services: “We wanted to reach out to provide an update as we experienced a glitch in our system yesterday with the status update for Tentfire Creek. It was meant to be updated to Being Held and, as a result of system error, it was then incorrectly noted that Tentfire Creek was Under Control. ” The story has been updated to reflect this.
As of Tuesday, the 2,400 ha fire burning in the Tentfire Creek area is now listed as “being held” on the BC Wildfire Service website.
The upgrade in classification comes on the heels of a weekend of cool weather and rain in the area.
While that rain has reduced the risk of fire down to low/moderate, the area is still under a campfire/open burn ban.
And, while more rain apparently fell on town than on the fire, it has gone a long way to controlling the fire. On Monday, the fire still smouldered, but no active flames were visible.
Of course, says Fire Chief Dustin Curry, under control is a long way from extinguished, and another patch of hot, dry weather might see the fire become active again. However, with cool weather and patches of rain, BCWS is optimistic. “As a result of the ongoing efforts of the Tumbler Ridge Fire Department, BC Wildfire Service personnel, all resources currently on the fire and the recent precipitation received in the area, there has been decreased fire activity on G71138 and it is unlikely that, under the forecasted conditions and suppression action on the fire, it will spread beyond its existing boundaries,” they wrote in a recent email.
As of Monday, the fire had 20 firefighters—including crews from Alberta, Prince George and Dawson Creek—8 pieces of heavy equipment such as bulldozers and excavators and two helicopter.
That’s the good news. The bad news is the fire, which was discovered on the north side of Tentfire Creek on Canada Day, has finally jumped to the south side of the creek.
While much of that side of the creek has been logged, there is a chance that it could start to burn up that side of the mountain as well.
This also means that people who have been going out to look at the fire are unable to drive up Tentfire Creek Road, due to active suppression activities along that road.
The fire experienced periods of rapid growth July 12-16, going from an estimated size of 1000 ha to 2,386 ha. On Tuesday, that number was rounded up to an estimated 2,400 ha. The fire is now about 18 km from the townsite.
The fire did not experience much growth over the weekend, as cool weather and rain did much to restrict the growth of the fire. It also allowed crews to build a few new fire breaks.
Part of that growth came after fire threw off sparks into two nearby areas, creating three distinct fires in the same general area.
But as of Saturday, the fire is being treated as a single area, so the area between the blazes has been added, even if the fire is not actively burning at the moment.
There’s good news/bad news in the forecast. While there is rain expected in the next few days, there is also a good chance of lighting.
BC Wildfire Service members have been cooling their heels for the last week, waiting for favourable weather to do a prescribed burn on the Tentfire Creek fire.
For much of the last two weeks, crews have been building guards and getting set for a prescribed burn between the fire and the fire guards. According to the Fire of Note page for the fire, everything is in place for the burns, but they’re still waiting on the weather.
The goal of a prescribed burn is to light controlled fires between the main body of the fire and the containment lines to eliminate the fuel in a controlled way. “This decreases the chance of the fire burning up to the containment line in an uncontrolled way and crossing or spotting over the containment line,” says B.C. Wildfire.
Heavy equipment is being used to shore up the existing fire guards, but some of the resources have been pulled to fight fires elsewhere in the province, as we crossed the 1000 wildfire on the year mark on July 13 (and are now over 1100).
The ten year average for Wildfires is 1352, while the most fires we’ve had in the province in the last decade is 2117, in 2018. Currently, more than 300 fires are burning across the province.
That fire, plus a second fire at Hook Creek, just west of Kinuseo Falls has forced the closure of Monkman Provincial Park to the public for safety reasons. Hiking trails accessed off the Monkman Falls Road remain closed as well.
The Hook Creek fire has grown to 258 ha, and is less than 1 km west of one of the town’s most popular tourism destinations. Jet boaters (access to the falls by the river is still open) have reported being able to see the fire from the river.
A third, 10 ha fire is burning near Boulder Lake, but is listed as “being held.”
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.