Siphon Creek fire has now crossed the BC-Alberta border. Photo courtesy BC Wildfire Service

Prince George, B.C. – Some progress was made Friday in the battle against the wildfires burning in northeastern BC.

Fire Information Officer Emily Epp says the Beatton Airport Road fire, burning northwest of Fort St. John, is estimated at 12,000 hectares in size while the Siphon Creek fire to the northeast is estimated at 24,000 hectares and has crossed into Alberta.  One evacuation order and two evacuation alerts remain in place in the Peace Region.

Epp says “our crews made good progress on the Beatton Airport Road fire.  The winds didn’t pose as much of a challenge as we were anticipating so that enabled the crews to get more worked done on building guard, and we also did some burning off along the Alaska Highway.”

She says crews worked on the Beatton fire throughout the night, adding “we are hopeful that the weather over the next couple of days, which is supposed to get a bit cooler with some potential rain on Sunday, will help with more progress being made on the fire.”  Epp says at it’s closest point, the fire is still 45 kilometres away from Fort St. John.  The Peace River Regional District says at this time, the City of Fort St John is not under evacuation order or alert, adding the probability of the fire reaching the city is quite low.

There are 122 crew members, 9 helicopters and 12 pieces of heavy equipment fighting the Beatton Airport Road fire, which has been determined to have been human caused.

Regarding the other major fire in the Peace Epp says “we did see quite a bit of fire activity and growth on the Siphon Creek fire (on Friday), and most of that growth was in Alberta, so on the eastern side.  We have crews working on that as well using structural protection units, so setting up sprinklers on nearby residences in the Evacuation Order area to help protect those structures.”  There were 77 crew members, 9 helicopters and 9 pieces of heavy equipment fighting the fire overnight.  Cause of that interface fire remains under investigation.

Again she says “we are hoping that this weekend will give us a bit of relief before we get back to seasonal temperatures on Monday and can make good progress on these fires.”

Approximately one thousand people in total have either been forced to leave their homes under order or are on alert that they may have to leave.  Charlie Lake is located within the area that was covered by the Evacuation Alert issued by the Peace River Regional District but Epp says “the only fire growth was toward the east (Friday) so Charlie Lake is not threatened.  As a precaution it’s been put on alert to make sure we were using extra caution and that people were prepared.”