Teenagers put out wildfire attributed to flaming raven

Yellowknife teenagers have described acting quickly to douse a brush fire near the city that witnesses say was caused by a raven touching power lines and catching fire.

Ignat Tarskii, 15, and 13-year-old Nick Girvan were spending Canada Day tubing on Back Bay when Tarskii heard a “big, loud bang from the power line” near Back Bay Cemetery.

“We could see that a fire started. We had to act quickly so we grabbed buckets and we started pouring out water,” Tarskii said.

Flaming ravens have become something of a legend in Yellowknife. In 2014, the CBC used the term in a headline to describe a bird that managed to electrocute itself on a power line, start a wildfire and cause a power outage.

More than a decade later, another raven appeared to enter the same corvid hall of infamy on Wednesday.

The NWT Power Corporation said the community of Dettah had lost power because of “possible bird contact on the Bluefish transmission line.” One branch of the Bluefish line runs along Back Bay, while some Yellowknife homes also experienced a brief power surge at about the time of the incident.

Scott Robertson, nearby, said he first heard the sound – a loud pop followed by a hum – and then saw the raven fall as a “big blue fireball” to the ground.

“It started a brush fire, and then the two boys went up with some other boaters and extinguished the fire,” Robertson told Cabin Radio.

More than 100 wildfires are active in the NWT right now, with two communities evacuated. A fire ban extends across the whole of the region around Yellowknife, including the city itself, because of the sheer level of risk in extreme fire weather. Winds gusted to 50 km/h on Wednesday afternoon.

“The flames, in these conditions and with this wind, were spreading quite rapidly,” said Robertson. “They were on it pretty quick and, I think, prevented it from becoming something that could have been much, much worse.”

Tarskii estimated the fire had spread to about five metres by five metres before the group brought it under control and extinguished it.

“If we weren’t there, it would have spread way more rapidly and it could have caused more damage,” he said.

Girvan said he had never been involved in anything like it.

“It was kind-of scary, but not really scary,” he said. “It was kind-of cool.”