Currently, on Vancouver Island, there is a 538-hectare out of control fire at Wesley Ridge/Cameron Lake, between Port Alberni and Qualicum Beach, forcing hundreds to flee their homes.
According to the Coastal Fire Centre there are 124 active wildfires in BC right now; 13 started in the last 24 hours, 96 started by lightning strikes and 20 are suspected to be human caused.
Although the qathet region has been fairly quiet on the wildfire front, a few human caused blazes earlier this summer have caused concern, especially on the one year anniversary of the historic Jasper wildfire that saw the town destroyed in July 2024.
"It’s been good to see the amount of coverage on the anniversary of the Jasper fire; certainly a historic and a very difficult event for that community," said qathet Regional District (qRD) general manager of emergency services Ryan Thoms, in a message to the Peak. "We’re nearing delivery of an updated Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan (CWRP) that will update the plan delivered 10 years ago."
This past July, Powell River-Sunshine Coast MLA Randene Neill announced that qRD would receive $40,000 of provincial funding for local evacuation planning projects, such as updating evacuation route plans and the community’s public notification plan.
"The CWRP will guide our preparedness, mitigation and response measures across the qRD," said Thoms. "It’s a little premature yet to talk about the direction, given the CWRP is not yet received, but safe to say we’ll continue to look at our coastal environment with our fuels, topography, weather and development patterns and how that results in a fire risk unique to here."
More specifically, said Thoms, instead of the Jasper fire with its interior pine ecosystem they will likely continue to look more at coastal fires.
"The current fire at Cameron Lake is a good example to learn from," added Thoms. "qRD is continuing to offer a FireSmart Program, offering free advice for residential property owners across the region."
Thoms also mentioned that qRD's evacuation planning assistant will be working over the coming year to engage with the many agencies involved in community emergency response.
"We are working toward updated evacuation routes and notification plans in partnership with: BC Ferries, ministry of transportation, fire departments, BC Wildfire Service, health authorities, Canadian Red Cross, to name just a few," said Thoms. "Many of these agencies have their own emergency planning requirements and coordinating together is a lot of effort, but we have a really great collaborative community here and that’s what will make these plans work."
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