Wildfire crews across BC are bracing for a cold front from the northwest that is expected to come down from Alaska today and meet a ridge of high-pressure air currently sitting over the province. The BC Wildfire Service has said this will likely create even stronger winds, dry lightning and a greater potential for new fire starts. BCWS superintendent Neal McLoughlin says the authority is very concerned about the forecast. He says crews have been working to secure guard on active fires throughout the province, but is warning the public to be alert as fires could spread very quickly across the landscape.
Brittany Seibert, an emergency program co-ordinator with the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen, says officials are searching for a person who was hiking near the Cathedral Provincial Park area when a nearby wildfire flared earlier this week. She says search and rescue is actively working to bring them to safety, just as 80 other people who were trapped at Cathedral Lakes Lodge were evacuated yesterday afternoon. Lodge guests, staff and campers were initially told to shelter in place on Tuesday after the fire created poor visibility and left debris on the access road. Seibert says the route was cleared yesterday and a convoy of evacuees left around 1 pm.
A recent trek through the Vancouver Island rainforest didn’t culminate in finding the world’s widest western red cedar but the quest did reveal a tree estimated to be 21-hundred years old in a grove of fellow giants. The tree is part of a generation experts worry may represent the last of the giants, as climate change jeopardizes their descendants’ ability to survive. Sally Aitken, a forestry professor at the University of British Columbia, says trees are resilient, but scientists don’t know what their limits are when it comes to tolerating worsening wildfires, storms and droughts. To give the giants of the future a fighting chance, Aitken says it’s important to protect areas where trees have the potential to grow for centuries to come.
Homicide investigators say a third suspect was involved in the killing of a Sikh leader outside a Surrey gurdwara earlier this year. Authorities are now looking for the suspected getaway driver, who was seen in a silver 2008 Toyota Camry waiting on 121 Street for two men who shot Hardeep Singh Nijjar in his own vehicle on June 18th. Anyone with information or who may have seen the vehicle is asked to contact investigators. Police say the two other suspects, who are described only as heavy-set men wearing face coverings, were seen fleeing the scene on foot.
A spokesman for the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team says an elected council member from the Kwikwetlem (kway-QUIT’-lum) First Nation who was reported missing last week has been found dead. Sergeant Timothy Pierotti says officers are still investigating the death of 44-year-old Stephanie Patterson, but confirms a man has been arrested in connection with the case. Pierotti says he has not been charged and no other details have yet been released. A statement from Kwikwetlem Chief Ron Giesbrecht and Councillor George Chaffee asks for privacy for the community for Patterson’s family.
Police in Vancouver say a man who was wanted Canada-wide after failing to report to his halfway house last week has been re-arrested. They say the 27-year-old is a federal offender who has been charged for numerous drug and weapons offences. Police say he initially went missing last Thursday after he was released from prison but failed to report to his halfway house in Vancouver. They say the man was re-arrested yesterday and now remains in custody awaiting his next court appearance.