Of the 145 firefighting personnel heading to Ontario and Quebec to help with firefighting efforts in those Provinces, 26 are from the Cariboo Wildfire Centre.
Fire Information Officer Kyla Fraser said that crews can be out of Province for 19 days and can be recalled at any time if fire activity in BC increases.
So what is the current rating?
“So right now we’re low to moderate throughout most of the Province except for in the far Northwest it is high. Yeah so most of BC is low to moderate thanks to the precipitation we’ve been receiving lately”.
Given the invaluable assistance that Ontario and Quebec provided to BC last summer, the BC Wildfire Service recognized the importance of sharing firefighting resources.
The request for assistance was made through the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre which co-ordinates the mutual sharing of firefighting resources between BC and other jurisdictions.
Fraser said “We had two initial attack crews which are made up of three firefighters in each crew for a total of six which left yesterday to go to Ontario. Tomorrow we have a unit crew which is made up of twenty firefighters leaving from the Cariboo Fire Centre going to Quebec”.