The return of smoky skies in the Kamloops area has meant helicopter crews battling the Embleton Mountain Fire near Sun Peaks are not able to proceed with some controlled burning.

Fire Information Officer, Hannah Swift, says the air crews are needed as the fire is burning in steep terrain making it hard for ground crews to attack it.

“Today, the focus is to complete sections of control line along the south and west perimeter and once those control lines in the area are complete, then efforts are going to be focused on bringing the fire perimeter downslope to these predetermined control lines,” she told NL News. “During those planned ignitions we have to draw that fire down to the control lines.

“The ignitions are going to be aerial ignitions, so we will need helicopters flying in order to carry out those ignitions.”

Swift says the helicopters will be up in the sky when the visibility improves, though its not clear when that could be.

“Those ignitions were set to start as early as today, however, with the smoke in the area, and with helicopters unable to fly due to poor visibility, those haven’t yet begun,” she said.

“This past weekend it was nice and clear, which was good, as crews were able to make really good progress on those control lines that we need to really have ready and in place with water delivery systems around securing the perimeter when that fire does successfully back down the slope to those control lines.”

The Embleton Mountain Fire is burning out of control at an estimated 604 hectares in size. It was discovered ten days ago, on July 9, and forced the evacuation of Whitecroft on July 10.

Sun Peaks Resort has been closed since July 11, as the community remains on evacuation alert. Properties around Heffley Lake are also on evacuation alert because of the fire.

Heffley-Louis Creek Road – the main road to Sun Peaks – is only open to residents, employees, and property owners that are not under evacuation order.

One of two planned controlled burns at Sparks Lake Fire goes ahead

At the massive Sparks Lake Fire, northwest of Kamloops, clear skies over the weekend allowed firefighters to move forward with a controlled burn in the Wadley Hill area, near Red Lake.

“What this did was it allowed crews to use a direct attack method which means they were able to apply water directly along the fire perimeter working from Wadley Hill north towards Frog Lake,” Fire Information Officer, Hannah Swift said.

“So that’s really been the focus, containing that area of the fire where we’ve seen some active fire behaviour.”

Swift says crews are planning for some controlled burning along the southeastern perimeter of the Sparks Lake Fire around the Sabiston Lake area as soon as conditions are favourable. That work was expected to begin as early as this past Saturday.

“We wanted to give the public a big heads up on that one because that’s going to be a larger area of planned ignition that will occur. However, they have not occurred yet,” Swift added. “We do have heavy equipment preparing the control lines in that area and that’s going to help us gain containment on the lower southeast perimeter.”

Just like at Embleton Mountain, Swift says this particular controlled burn will need air support as well and so crews are waiting for the visibility to improve.

“At Sparks Lake, we have seen some winds pick up in the evening but crews have been able to successfully hold containment lines that are in place. The wind has been a good test just to see if those will hold and so far so good,” Swift added.

“We have seen active fire behaviour along those containment lines but again we just have crews patrolling and putting out any excursions.”

An evacuation order remains in place for 289 properties in the TNRD impacted by the Sparks Lake Fire. Several hundred other properties are on evacuation alert. The Skeetchestn Indian Band has also issued evacuation orders for some residents in the area.

At 45,167 hectares – or 451 sq. km., the Sparks Lake Fire is the largest in the province. It broke out on June 28 and it is suspected to be human caused.