Provincial crews kept busy with wildfires
Posted May 21, 2013 12:14 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The conditions might have improved but provincial crews were still kept busy over the long weekend with the threat of wildfire.
According to Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development first-responders were called to 174 fires, much of them in the Calgary area.
Wildfire Information Officer Anastasia Drummond tells 660News of those fires a majority of them are either under control or extinguished.
She says much of the fires were manmade and caused by campfires.
It’s been two years since the fire in Slave Lake and May is typically a tough time for the province.
“The snow is gone, we haven’t really seen any spring rains and we haven’t seen any of the green-up happening,” Drummond says. “So there’s a lot of dead standing grass, debris, twigs…. logs, that kind of thing left behind to catch fire.”
But she adds things now are finally are starting to improve.
“Part of what we’re seeing is we’re getting a little more moisture,” she says. “We’re starting to see things green up which is making a big difference across the province, with green grass….. it’s making things much less flammable.”
Drummond says the hazard is still high or hazardous in other parts of the province such as Fort McMurray and Lac La Biche.
Right now 24 wildfires fires are burning in Alberta.
