{"id":56702,"date":"2015-07-23T15:28:29","date_gmt":"2015-07-23T07:28:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=56702"},"modified":"2015-07-23T15:28:29","modified_gmt":"2015-07-23T07:28:29","slug":"b-c-premier-clark-fears-raging-wildfires-new-norm-blames-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2015\/07\/23\/b-c-premier-clark-fears-raging-wildfires-new-norm-blames-climate-change\/","title":{"rendered":"B.C. Premier Clark fears raging wildfires new norm, blames climate change"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Christy<\/a>
Christy Clark ( Photo from Flickr\/Kris Kr\u00fcg)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WEST KELOWNA, B.C. \u2013 Relentless forest fires burning across British Columbia may be the new normal, Premier Christy Clark warned as she stood not far from a raging fire that threatened homes in her own riding.<\/p>\n

Clark spoke near the Westside Road fire outside West Kelowna on Wednesday, where flames have forced emergency officials to issue evacuation orders to the residents of 70 homes.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s one of 10 evacuation alerts or orders across the province, where more than 250 blazes are burning, 43 of which broke out on Tuesday following a series of lightning storms.<\/p>\n

The premier said she is concerned that climate change has altered the terrain, drying out the land and making it more vulnerable to fire, and as a result what B.C. is seeing isn’t unusual and will happen more often.<\/p>\n

As of Wednesday, the province has spent more than $140 million battling the 1,300 wildfires that have broken out this season, and Clark said the province could spend another $300 to $400 million this year if the pace continues.<\/p>\n

She doesn\u2019t think the fires will put the province into a deficit, because the government ran a surplus of $1.7 billion last year and is expected to run a surplus again this coming fiscal year, Clark said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am mostly concerned … that the forest fire season won\u2019t give us a break and that we\u2019re going to see more homes threatened, more people\u2019s livelihood threatened, more forest resources lost.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clark said B.C. must continue to fight climate change, be better prepared for wildfires and have the necessary resources to fight them.<\/p>\n

The fire in Clark\u2019s riding is particularly unsettling because hundreds of homes were lost in 2003 when a wildfire swept through Kelowna \u2013 just across Okanagan Lake from the current blaze.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Kelowna, we are becoming more and more familiar with this, and so it\u2019s kind of like every summer they kind of get the band back together,\u201d said Clark.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody comes to the co-ordination centre,\u201d she said. \u201cThey all know how they interrelate because sadly we are doing this every year now, but boy we do it better than anybody else in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

About 40 per cent of wildfires are human caused, and Clark said the government is considering stiffer fines for people who start fires by acting negligently, such as throwing burning cigarettes out of vehicle windows or leaving campfires unattended.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Forests Minister Steve Thomson said he asked his parliamentary secretary Mike Morris to review the sanctions and bring forward ideas that may deter people from \u201cirresponsible behaviour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Glen Burgess, the incoming incident commander for the Westside Road fire, said they\u2019ve been unable to contain any area of the blaze, but the number of personnel has increased three-fold since Monday.<\/p>\n

Crews have dropped fire retardant on the north and south flanks and have burned out fuels ahead of the fire, he said.<\/p>\n

Burgess said firefighters are making progress and protecting homes remains the priority.<\/p>\n

Campfire bans have been lifted in the Prince George and the Northwest fire centres, though fireworks, burn barrels and fires over half a square metre remain prohibited, said fire information officer Kevin Skrepnek.<\/p>\n

A campfire ban still covers the southern half of the province.<\/p>\n

Rain is expected to fall along coastal B.C. on Friday, said Skrepnek, and northern areas will likely see cool temperatures and showers.<\/p>\n

\u201cReally, we see the weekend as being the best chance for some rain, particularly in the souther Interior, where we do have a number of fires,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of relief, from the weather perspective that\u2019s likely the earliest we\u2019d see it in the form of rain.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WEST KELOWNA, B.C. \u2013 Relentless forest fires burning across British Columbia may be the new normal, Premier Christy Clark warned …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":24785,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[35],"class_list":["post-56702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-original","mauthors-keven-drews","mauthors-the-canadian-press1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}