Fort Simpson fire becomes ‘continual challenge’ in residential areas

Firefighters in Fort Simpson expected Sunday to bring more helpful conditions but an ongoing battle to protect some homes from wildfire FS016.

The fire reached residential areas south of the main village over the past couple of days and remains embedded in those areas, even though no homes have been reported lost.

Fire information officer Forrest Tower called that a “continual challenge” that requires around-the-clock patrols in affected neighbourhoods.

“Fire completely moved across those areas and burned down essentially to the Liard River in several areas. There are trees that have been on fire that are still smouldering,” Tower said on Sunday morning.

“Wild Rose and Gill Crescent will be basically where all of our resources are today,” he said, referring to neighbourhoods south the main village.

“We will likely have skimmers and air tankers up again as needed, and we’ve been able to have our helicopters flying every day.

“We still have favourable winds in terms of it’s not moving toward the town, so it’s moving south away. So that’s helpful.”

The fire burned south for much of Saturday toward Fort Simpson’s airport. No airport infrastructure has been affected, Tower said, and the situation did not meaningfully change overnight.

“Structure protection crews are patrolling, managing sprinklers, working if there’s any hot spots or areas that are more actively on fire near structures. Those guys will deal with that and the wildland firefighters are working more in the tree lines, trying to limit any spread,” Tower said.

Cooler temperatures and favourable winds may stick around for at least the next couple of days, although Tower warned that any shift in the wind could cause new problems and the fuel in the area is already extremely dry.

FS016 is “as close to structures as it can be without them burning down, and that’s the challenge for structural firefighters,” he said.

“I don’t mean that all the trees in that area are on fire, but there will be areas of grass, or it might get into firewood piles and start to catch on fire, so they just have to continually patrol and move around and put out things that catch on fire.

“They might go past someone’s house four or five times, no fire, and then on the sixth time, when they come around, there’s something on fire in their yard that they have to go deal with.”