Connect with us

Sports

Canada wildfires 2024: The latest on active wildfire counts, maps, evacuation orders, air quality and smoke alerts nationwide

Published

on

Canada wildfires 2024: The latest on active wildfire counts, maps, evacuation orders, air quality and smoke alerts nationwide

Officials in B.C. are helping co-ordinate the evacuation of Jasper National Park in Alberta while managing more over 300 wildfires burning from Vancouver Island to the province’s far northeast.

There are more than 350 fires burning throughout the province — with evacuation orders for more than 440 properties and alerts for over 3,000 in a situation the Ministry of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness has called “dynamic and ever-changing.”

For current B.C. evacuation orders and alerts, click HERE.

B.C. to host evacuees from Jasper National Park

The Jasper townsite — and the park’s main east-west artery Highway 16 — were surrounded by blazes Monday night, with fires threatening from the northeast cut off highway access east to Edmonton.

An evacuation alert was sent just after 10 p.m. MT. The Municipality of Jasper declared a state of emergency shortly after.

For current air quality statements and alerts in B.C., click HERE.

Thousands were forced to flee the municipality of Jasper with little notice over mountain roads through darkness, soot and ash.

Evacuees from Jasper, Alta., clog the highway early Tuesday morning. (The Canadian Press/HO-X/@_CLCampbell)

Evacuees from Jasper, Alta., clog the highway early Tuesday morning. (The Canadian Press/HO-X/@_CLCampbell)

In B.C., the province scrambled to find accommodation for evacuees.

“B.C. will do everything we can to provide safe refuge for evacuees from Jasper, and are working as quickly as possible to co-ordinate routes and arrange host communities on our side of the border,” Bowinn Ma, B.C.’s minister for emergency management, said in a post on the social media site X.

Residents fear losing historic Barkerville to wildfire

First discovered on July 20, the Antler Creek wildfire is growing rapidly in B.C.’s central Interior — to the point where authorities are issuing evacuation orders for several communities, including the historic settlement of Barkerville.

WATCH | How crews are protecting Barkerville Historic Town:

Continue Reading