Just because the St. Mary River fire is now considered being held, doesn’t mean crews don’t still have their work cut out for them.
BC Wildfire Service director Cliff Chapman says they will strengthen areas of concern in case the weather changes for the worse.
“Our goal is to make sure we have trigger points identified so if there is a weather event coming in we can have the appropriate resources if we believe that fire may pop back up and challenge our containment lines.”
He added that resources are coming off the fire, but not all of them.
“We won’t see every resource come off of that fire but obviously, we also need to prioritize the rest of the fires burning in the province,” Chapman said.
“Getting the fire to be held is a significant achievement, considering the conditions that we’ve seen in the southeast portion of the province.”
Work is expected to continue for a while and residents may still see smoke in the air but it shouldn’t be a concern.
“It doesn’t mean that it’s challenging the containment lines but it will be visible likely for the coming days and weeks ahead,” he said.
The fire grew to an estimated 4,640 hectares since it was sparked on July 17.
