The best way to fight a wildfire is to prevent it from spreading and thanks to a grant from the Forest Enhancement Society of BC, one local community is getting a jump on it.

Garnet Mierau is the Senior Planning Forester with the Logan Lake Community Forest Management and he says one major roadway could be a major problem if a fire is allowed to get out of hand. “The Coquihalla Highway is a very big ignition source for us.”

“So, we want to prevent fire from coming into our community forest there, so we’re looking at reducing some of the fuel loading in there, by doing some partial cutting and building another road that parallels that section so that if there was a fire to happen, it would just sort of stay along the ground and not sort of go up a ladder, fuels up branches and into the crown and then go on a run into the community forest.”

Mierau points out they’ve been working closely with the Highland Valley Outdoor Association, looking into where forests in the area need thinning so if a fire breaks out, it won’t have the opportunity to spread.