Duane Hicks
With the Ministry of Natural Resources’ fire season officially starting April 1, the potential for early fires will be higher than normal due to the dry conditions.
“The weather specialists in Sault Ste. Marie have been monitoring the snowfall, and pretty much all across Ontario it’s below normal,” said Deb McLean, fire information officer with MNR Aviation, Forest Fire, and Emergency Services.
“On a trend basis, looking for early patterns, we are entering an early spring with what looks like dry conditions,” she noted.
“The implication for the fire program is that if these dry conditions persist, and we don’t get a lot more snow or spring rain, then we’ll be entering the fire season with dry conditions combined with the over-winter dead grass and vegetation. . . .
“And that’s a recipe for fast fire spread.
“The other factor is human behaviour,” McLean added. “In the springtime, really the only cause of fires in the West Fire Region is human-caused [ones].
“It isn’t until we hit the end of May or beginning of June that we start to get thunderstorms that may start lightning-caused fires,” she explained.
“So our focus is on people and how they manage their fires.”
McLean said the Forest Fires Prevention Act kicks in on April 1 and with that are restrictions, like no day burning of brush and grass.
The public is encouraged to check out www.ontario.ca/fireprevention for more information.
But even prior to then, people will be held responsible if they start fires and they burn out of control.
“People are definitely out there and they’re thinking about burning grass and brush,” said McLean. “Clearly, there is potential for wildfire.
“Although we don’t have the legislation in place to say, ‘Don’t burn during the day,’ we do caution people to be aware of the conditions,” she remarked.
“If it’s windy, don’t burn. If it’s a really dry day with a lot of spread potential, reconsider, or certainly have the resources available to control the fire—tools, people, water, and all that kind of thing,” she stressed.
McLean said if a fire escapes and threatens people or values, conservation officers will be called in and the blaze will be investigated.
“We don’t want to give the impression that outside of the fire season, there’s nothing being done,” she noted.
The first fire of the year was reported Wednesday in Thunder Bay District.
The one-hectare blaze, which was put “out” the same day, started near a trailer park in an unorganized area outside of the City of Thunder Bay.
No other fires have been reported in the West Fire Region so far.
McLean noted the past couple of years have been quiet with regards to winter and spring fires, but “it isn’t unheard of to have fires before the fire season starts.”
“In fact, we’ve have some winters when fires smouldered through the winter, say if somebody had a shore lunch fire and didn’t put it out, and it smouldered and burned,” she explained.
“We haven’t had reports of that happening much. But we do have this concern about the dry conditions.
“Of course, it’s early and the forecast is calling for cold weather and possible snow flurries [this weekend],” McLean added.
“We want to keep it in perspective, but having said that, we did have a fire yesterday [Wednesday] in one of our districts.”
The total number of fires in Ontario last season was 384, burning 20,656 hectares in all.
The West Fire Region recorded 194 fires, having consumed a total area of 13,934 ha.
It was the second-slowest on record in terms of the number of forest fires, close behind the 2008 forest fire season, when there only were 341 fires in Ontario, burning just 1,316 ha.
