The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, July 26, 1995 - A3

FOREST SERVICE officials are
heading into the critical portion
of their forest fire season,

As of late last week, 115 fires
were on the books compared to
76 for the same period last year.

And most of this year's damage
is being caused by four large fires
far to the north,

“Typically, when you have
clear skies and hot temperatures
and it heats up it’s broken up by a
lightning storm,’’ says regional
Gre control officer Tom Hedin,

‘Up here we can expect those
kinds of lightning storms the third
week of July going into the first
week of August You can get 40
to 50 fires in three days because
of a lightning storm.’”

The average number of fires in
the northwest is 220 each year.

Those four northern fires began
the middle of June and have con-
sumed more than 12,000ha of
trees, nearly all of the 14,500ha
burned from all fires to date in
the northwest.

Smoke from the fires drifted
into Terrace, Smithers and Fort
St James last week, causing a

‘ number ‘of phone calls to the |

regionai fire control] centre.
Smoke from the fires has also

drifted into the Mackenzie area in

. he northeast portion of the pro-
vince.

The fircs are in Inklin River

area, 350 miles northwest of Ter- ;
tace. There’s no road access to

the area, no people living there
and timber values are negligible.
**Since there’s no risk and no
value, they’re being left to burn,”’
said Hedin of a 1989 policy
which laid out at what point
forest fires would be fought.

SELF CONTAINED fire fighting trucks form the backbone of the
‘forest service's initial attack crews. That's Terrace crew member
| Travis Elwood (bottom) getting a hand from Gord Munro In put

ting equipment on the truck. The Terrace crew Is located at the
airport, a convenient location shou
ter Into an area in which thera are

Bracing for stormy weather

crews to fires very quickly and to
get information back very quick-
ly,” Bruce Hutchinson, another
fire control officer commented,

The regional office handles four
unit crews of 20 people each and
10 initial attack crews of three
people each. —

One of the unit crews is based

in Kitimat and the Terrace airport ©

is home to one of the initial attack
crews. That’s so it can respond
quickly by air to 2 fire, The forest

“You can get 40 to 50 fires In three days because

of a lightning storm.” ....

wee Hedin

“Once you get past the initial
altack phase you’d be into the
millions of dollars to fight those
fires. It simply wouldn’t make
any sense, I've flown that area in
the past and there are huge fire
scars from the past,’’ he added.

Hedin is based in Smithers, the
home of a new regional forest
service forest fire centre. In the
past, the eight district offices ra
their own fire centres... os

“T's cut ‘down oa so much’

duplication, We're able to get

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ONLY

Thursday, July 27
Friday, July 28 -
Saturday, July 29 -

GENUINE LA-Z-BOY
Recliner Chair

in Forest Green Leather
$1299 + 12 = $108.25 per manth

All taxes due at time of purchase.

service also has a district fire of-
ficer stationed at the airport.

The airport base also contains
foam so the region’s air tanker
canrefill here, =

Although it has been fairly dry
in the area, crews were sent east
to help Ontario firefighters in
June.

“We had quite a few people
back there — one of the unit
crews and four initia] attack |

crews. We sent two of ‘our air’ ’

control officers and an air tanker’

back there and two of our staff fire.

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ld they have to take a helicop-
no roads.

people,’” said Hutchinson.
All were on a 24-hour recall if
necessary.

year, even though we didn’t have .
as many fires up here, the num-

bers were up throughout the pro-

vince and we had crews in from

Ontario,”’ said Hutchinson,

five years ago began adopting
B.C. equipment and methods of
fighting forest fires.

| we use and the concept of three-
men initial
Hutchinson added.

come standardized across Canada

and that'll make everything a lot
easier,” he said. ;

take note of when reporting a
forest fire,

calls

routed through a centre in Kam-
loops.

That means regional officers
will receive only single notifica-
lions of fires instead of taking
scores of phone calls for each |

“Tt was payback time. Last

He added that Ontario crews

“They like the light equipment
attack crews,”

“This is also a chance to be-

kkk kk
There’s also a new 1-800 to

It's 1-800-663-5555 and all
from the northwest are

‘the health ministry each year for each hospital in the province,

News In Brief

Man killed in accident

BURNS LAKE RCMP continue to investigate a July 17 accident on
Hwy16 7km west of Burns Lake which took the life of Terrace resi-
dent Andrew Wann, 76.

Wann’s vehicle crossed into the ancoming lane, colliding with a
pickup driven by Telkwa resident John Mill, He was taken to Prince
George for transfer 10 Vancouver but died July 18 before the trans-
fer took place.

Wann was driving through a section of highway being repaved at
the time of the accident, say Burns Lake RCMP. His car ended up
on its roof in a ditch.

Betty Wann, Wann’s wifc, was injured as was pickup driver Mill.

Don't touch that tap!

TOUGHER SPRINKLING restrictions are now in the effect as the
city conducts its annual problem of high demand and low supply.

Lawn sprinkling is only allowed between the hours of 6 p.m. and
5 p.m., says city works official Brad Nori, And the odd-even
house number matched to odd-even days schedule continues.

**These. are second stage restrictions. We’re trying to give the
reservoir a chance to build up overnight,” oe said.

Average daily water consumption last week was 14.5 million
lites, too much for the capacity of the city system to rejuvenate it-
self, Also of importance is ensuring a sufficient water supply to
fight fires.

North said the early summer run off from the mountains has now
slowed, reducing the amount of water that ows down for storage.
Daily consumptions of 16 million litres a month or so ago could be
handled then because there was more runoff,

‘*But now, with run off slowing, there's no buffer,’’ said North.
The city can lay fines and, in some cases, shut the water off at
residences which to not obey the restrictions. .

Airport traffic steady

THE NUMBER of people using the Terrace airport is fairly steady
given the results of past years, says manager Darryl Laurent. To the
end of June, 44,200 people either took off or landed at the airport.

we're on track to mecting or just exceeding our normal average,”’
he said,

Passenger counts in 1993 totalled 86,700 and 89,249 in 1994,

“For an area in which there is nothing really major going on in
terms of one project — a Kemano Ii, for example — we're getting
good numbers,’” said Laurent. That Kemano reference dates back to
1990 when 104,600 people used the airport during the Alcan pro-
ject’s mostactive year, a

| Getting up there

THE COST of spending a day at a provincial hospital rivals that of

getting a bed at an exclusive hotel in London or New York.
Information from Mills Memorial Hospital indicates it now costs

uninsured pationts $575 a day for a bed. The rate is established by

Birth rate dips
THE NUMBER of babies born per 1,000 residents in 1994 was the
lowest in 40 years, states the provincial government’s 1994 Vital
Statistics Report. That rate is 12.9 births per thousand residents. °
But the number of births is increasing — listed at 45,924 —is a
reflection of the growing population of the province. At.the same
time, the average of women giving birth is increasing. In 1994, the

i

“Given that we’re now into the busy time of the year, I’d say [

‘| average first time mother was 26.8 yéars ofage,

~~
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