The forest fire hazard rating is high to extreme in many areas of British Columbia right now.

Lightning storms are starting hundreds of new small fires stretching the capabilities of the fire fighting crews. 300 fire fighters have left Ontario, where the fire hazard is low, to assist the fire fighting crews in B.C.

When the forest fire hazard rating reaches extreme levels, logging operations are often halted to ensure the safety of the crews, and to insure that none of the logging equipment sparks any new fires.

Retired forester Paul Diggle says parks such as Mount Doug in Saanich north of Victoria have been left in a natural state full of dead trees and branches, and a lightning storm could spark some massive fires.

"Victoria is not a high lightning strike area. If we had the number of lightning strikes that Kelowna has, then we would for sure have had some catastrophic fires. We had lightning last Saturday evening, but we had rain with it," said Diggle.

About 1,000 residents near the Terrace Mountain fire on the northwestern shore of Lake Okanagan are still waiting to return home, as that fire continues to burn across 4,500 hectares. Fire officials estimate it is still only 60 per cent contained and estimate it will be several more days before the evacuation orders in the region are lifted.

Tolko is reporting that they have already lost an estimated 2,000 truckloads of timber to the Terrace Mountain fire.

The Mount McLean Fire, four kilometres west of Lillooet, was still burning across 1,000 hectares and is zero per cent contained. Two properties remain under evacuation orders on the northeastern shore of Seton Lake, but fire officials say the blaze is not threatening the town of Lillooet itself.

Source:
Fire and lightning fuel concerns for B.C. forests (CBC)

Additional Information:
Wildfire of Note in B.C.
Current Fire Weather Map