Heavy Smoke in Prince George is from Cariboo Wildfires
Thick smoke from Cariboo wildfires continues to blanket the Prince George airshed. Photo 250 News
Prince George, B.C. – The heavy smoke experienced in Prince George in the past few days has come directly from the major wildfires burning in the Cariboo Fire Centre.
Amanda Reynolds at the Prince George Fire Centre says just like the media, they have been receiving several queries about the source of the thick smoke, with some wondering whether there are serious fires burning close to our city. The BC Wildfire Service lists just three “wildfires of note” in the Prince George Fire Centre.
Reynolds told 250 News late Saturday night that, up until Thursday the wind was coming from the north and pushing everything south. “Then on Friday the wind shifted and is coming from the southwest, pushing everything northeast.”
She says “we have some fires a hundred kilometres south of Vanderhoof but this smoke isn’t from them. The Cariboo Fire Centre has had some aggressive fire behaviours today (Saturday) with the cold front coming in with the winds. The smoke is from the Cariboo fires, especially west of Quesnel, which isn’t that far from us.”
Redynolds says we are now experiencing what has been going on for the past ten days. Like this is what it’s like in Williams Lake, I was just down there for eight days. And with the shift of the wind from the southwest, it’s pushing everything up north.”
Comments
Everything outside is covered in black. Plants and flowers, vehicles, deck, birds, windows. Gonna be awhile cleaning up.
and the black is still coming down.
Been years since I’ve seen this amount of ash fall I haven’t seen it like this since slash burning was stopped
When was slash burning stopped?
Back in the mid 90’s it started to slow down and was almost non existent by ’99
Last fall they did slash burning all along the north side of the hwy from the top of Cluculz hill for at least a km.
Slash burns still happen but they are few and far between and are tightly controlled by the Ministry of Forests but back when Slash burns were common place August thru to Oct when the majority happened it was a common sight to see up to 15 mushroom clouds of smoke in a given area and some were huge bordering on several hundred hectares it was an awesome sight to behold but if the wind was up you hoped and prayed for it to blow the other way as it was common place to see what we saw over the last few days
Sometimes the smoke was so thick you literally couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of you and in my 14 years of forest fire fighting the vast majority of forest fires were actually slash burns that jumped the fire lines that were purpose built for the burns. I miss them because they were great at promoting new growth and bringing wildlife back into the areas but in todays world of sensitive people and environmentalists/eco-terrorists those days of mass slash burns are gone
Was at the lake yesterday and at 6pm day turned to night, not just dark but black as I’ve ever seen it on the darkest nights… couldn’t even see the tree line 150 feet away. I have never seen smoke like that before ever.
pretty eerie outside last night awake most of the night checking the perimeter for fire. Smoke and ash was fairly intense.
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