This article needs to be updated.(August 2018) |
2018 British Columbia wildfires | |
---|---|
Date(s) | Evacuations: Ended, 2018 Provincial state of emergency: August 15, 2018 – September 7, 2018 |
Location | British Columbia, Canada |
Statistics | |
Burned area | 1,351,314 [1] hectares (3,339,170 acres) as of November 9, 2018 [1] |
Land use | Forest and residential |
Impacts | |
Deaths | Unknown |
Non-fatal injuries | Unknown |
Structures destroyed | ~50 [2] |
Damage | Unknown |
Ignition | |
Cause | Lightning and Human-Caused |
Season | |
← 2017 |
By the end of June 2018, there had been more than 560 wildfires in British Columbia. [3]
The Comstock Lake fire, discovered on June 21, was caused by lightning. By July 6, it had grown to 27.5 square kilometres (10.6 sq mi) and was not fully contained. [4] At one point over 200 personnel were fighting the fire complex. [5]
The Tugwell Creek fire near Sooke grew to 85 hectares (210 acres), and was 10% contained by July 4. [6] The fire threatened millions of honeybees at Tugwell Creek Honey Farm and Meadery. It was fully contained on July 9. [7]
The Shovel Fire, started on July 27, burned at least 86,397 hectares (213,490 acres), and was still active as of August 20. Thick smoke harmed efforts to contain the fire. [8]
A human-caused fire at Nanaimo Lakes, discovered on July 1, reached 14.5 hectares by July 4. [6]
A total of 2,115 wildfires burned 1,351,314 hectares (3,339,170 acres) of land in 2018 as of November 9. [9]
As of August 28, initial estimates put 2018 as the largest burn-area in a British Columbia wildfire season, [1] surpassing the historic 2017 wildfire season (1,216,053 total hectares). [10] The total land burned in 2018 represented about ~1.4% of the total area of the province.
Ranking | Fire | Size | Date discovered | Status | Ref |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Tweedsmuir Complex fire | 301,549 hectares (745,140 acres) | August 8 | Out | [11] |
2 | Johnny Creek Fire | 156,775 hectares (387,400 acres) | August 4 | Out | [12] |
3 | Alkali Lake Complex fire | 121,215 hectares (299,530 acres) | August 1 | Out | [13] |
4 | Lutz Creek Complex fire | 100,799 hectares (249,080 acres) | August 4 | Out | [12] |
5 | Shovel Lake fire | 92,412 hectares (228,360 acres) | July 27 | Out | [8] |
6 | Nadina Lake fire | 86,767 hectares (214,410 acres) | July 31 | Out | [14] |
7 | Verdun Mountain fire | 47,610 hectares (117,600 acres) | July 31 | Out | [15] |
8 | Silver Lake fire | 23,042 hectares (56,940 acres) | August 5 | Out | [16] |
9 | Tommy Lakes | 21,795 hectares (53,860 acres) | May 22 | Out | [17] |
10 | Island Lake fire | 21,381 hectares (52,830 acres) | August 1 | Out | [16] |
11 | Chutanli Lake fire | 20,813 hectares (51,430 acres) | August 1 | Out | [16] |
Wildfires caused severe smoke to cover much of British Columbia. It has impacted tourism and cancelled flights. [18] The smoke spread across Canada and as far as Ireland. In Prince George, British Columbia smoke orange sky at 8:40 AM, and 9:10 AM turns into midnight from wildfires. Then 3 PM in Grande Prairie, Alberta thick layered smoke plume generated by the fire which turned day into night during the afternoon of that day at the location. [19]
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