Prince George, B.C.- The current forecast calls for hot dry conditions  for the  week ahead,  but there  is  a possibility  of a ‘cooling trend’  by the middle of the month,  and  that  is something the  B.C. Wildfire Service is  hoping will  happen.“We are keeping an eye on that for any possible relief from the (current) situation”  says  BC Wildfire Service Chief Information Officer Kevin Skrepnek “Until then, we  are expecting, and preparing for continued hot and dry conditions challenging  in terms of lightning and new fire starts and no real relief for at least the next week,  at least.”

The Elephant Hill fire  has been burning for a   full month now,   and  there are still no signs of it letting up.  It is  estimated to be 110 thousand hectares in size,   it is 30% contained, but there was  aggressive behaviour last evening on the north east  flank of that fire. The B.C. Wildfire Service has  488  firefighters, an incident management team,  92 structural  protection personnel,  86 support staff , 22 helicopters and 105 pieces of heavy equipment  working on trying to  contain this blaze.

Skrepnek is not able to say  definitively if people are honouring the  restrictions on campfires  or  off  road vehicles, “I think generally, people are getting the message ” says Skrepnek  “The fact that we conditions that are as hot and as dry  and as  volatile  as they are right now,  and that we are only getting  about  6 new fires ( a day),  I think that  speaks to the fact that people are taking the  threat of human caused fires seriously.   With conditions that dire, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to be getting dozens of new fires  every day.”

It is possible back country  and off road vehicle restrictions could be  increased  says Skrepnek,  as  the conditions are monitored  daily.

Since April,  the fires in B.C. have burned an estimated 591 thousand hectares,  an area larger than the entire province of Prince Edward Island.