Global Courant
Residents near an out-of-control wildfire visible from downtown Kelowna, BC, have been ordered to evacuate from their homes on Canada Day.
Firefighters and aerial bombers tackled the burning Knox Mountain within Okanagan city limits.
The fire broke out on Saturday and by mid-afternoon it was estimated to be four acres.
Jodie Foster, an extension officer at the Central Okanagan Emergency Operations Center, said two evacuation orders have been issued for the Magic Estates and Poplar Point areas of Kelowna, covering a total of 448 properties, due to a wildfire.
Officials also issued an evacuation alert for several other nearby properties.
Wayne Stann was one of the residents ordered to evacuate from his Magic Estates neighborhood.
He learned of the fire threatening his home when he turned on his phone after a game of bridge on Saturday.
“I had a lot of messages — text and voice messages — (that) there was a fire in my subdivision,” he told CBC News. “The third time in 25 years; I hope everything is okay.”
An airplane drops a flame retardant on the Knox Mountain wildfire on Saturday, July 1, 2023. (Brady Strachan/CBC)
When he arrived at his subdivision, he found police guarding a barricade blocking incoming traffic.
In hindsight, he wishes he had brought cash, plus photos of several new purchases for insurance purposes.
“There’s not much you can do,” Stann said in an interview at the barricade. “It’s dry in here.
“I live on top of a mountain, but there are a lot of trees everywhere, and they’re flammable… It’s a fact of life in the Okanagan.”
Only 2 km north of the center
Firefighters tackled the blaze when authorities asked everyone to stay away from the area for their own safety and that of emergency personnel.
“It’s just north of downtown Kelowna, so it’s very visible to the surrounding area,” Aydan Coray, a firefighter’s officer with the BC Wildfire Service (BCWS), told CBC News.
“It’s still classified as out of control at this point… so there will be quite a bit of activity in the area.”
Copl. West Kelowna RCMP’s Judith Bertrand says the cause of the fire is unknown and the number of residents to be evacuated is unclear as the situation continues to unfold.
Bertrand says the area around Knox Mountain is quite dense and a popular tourist spot, and police are assisting firefighters with the evacuation to ensure public safety.
The location of a four-acre wildfire that caused evacuations just north of downtown Kelowna, BC, can be seen with a red dot on this map released Saturday. (BC Wildfire Service)
She says the Magic Estates area around the mountain is being evacuated because the wind makes it difficult to predict the direction of the fire.
The wildfire service deployed helicopters, fire-retardant aircraft and ground crews to fight the fire.
Vacationers saw BCWS planes carrying red flame retardants drop above the plume of smoke from the blaze on Saturday afternoon.
As of 3 p.m., 12 BCWS personnel were on scene near the blaze and more are on the way, Coray said, as the blaze showed visible flames and a “moderate spread rate.”
“We have personnel on standby at all our bases throughout the long weekend,” Coray added, noting that the continued hot and dry weather in the Okanagan region has made new fires more likely.
Evacuation orders have affected the following areas:
Poplar Point.North of Knox Mountain Park Drive.Knox Mountain Park.Magic Estates.Rio Drive.All areas west of Clifton Drive.
