More than 1.08 million hectares burned in 1,688 fires during 2024.
Chalk up another highly destructive wildfire season for B.C.
Although not record breaking, the more than 10,800 square kilometres burned in 1,688 fires during 2024 comes in as the fourth-largest wildfire season in B.C.
More than 70 per cent of wildfires this past season were caused by lightning, while almost all others were attributed to human activity. A small percentage remains undetermined.
“They probably spent as many days on the line, or as close to as many days on the line, as they did in 2023,” said Chapman in a year-end summary.
In the Prince George fire region alone, which includes northeast B.C. where the fire season got off to an early start, 10 per cent of the forested land base burned in 2024, noted provincial officials.
In 2024, about $621 million was spent fighting fires, down from $1.09 billion in 2023.
While there were no mass evacuations such as there were in 2023 in the Okanagan and Shuswap regions, in 2024 there were 51 evacuation orders, which affected more than 4,100 properties. Another 112 evacuation alerts affected more than 11,600 properties.
In 2024, the provincial wildfire reporting centre fielded over 18,000 calls, 12,421 of which were wildfire reports.
Provincial officials noted that the growing impact of climate change is creating more demand for advanced wildfire strategies in rural and remote communities.
Chapman noted they they had also implemented the use of the night vision flying for helicopters, which was a big step forward in how the province fights fire at night.
The minister of emergency management and climate readiness, Kelly Greene, said about the 2024 wildfire season: “People’s lives are increasingly being impacted by the effects of climate change, and we must be proactive in how we prepare for climate-driven emergencies.”
New research published this week shows the public should expect an increasing number of more severe fire seasons in the future.
The study by researchers including at the University of B.C. and Thompson Rivers University, published in the peer-reviewed journal Science, examined fire severity from 1981 to 2020 across Canada.
The research found that across all kinds of areas, the number of high-burn severity days exhibited significant increases during the 40-year period, with higher increases in the the most recent 20-year period.
“The northeast and northwest ecozones showed the greatest increases, ranging between seven and 15 per cent, which were expected to exacerbate regional fire season because these areas had a severe burning condition in summer and the increases primarily occurred in spring and autumn,” said the study.
Researchers found the greatest drivers of change were dry fuels, including the moisture level of the upper level of the forest floor.
Guangyu Wang, a University of B.C. associate forestry professor and one of the authors of the study, said the changes are being driven by drier weather and less snow cover.
That can lead to earlier and longer wildfire seasons, said Wang.
The findings have significant implications for fire management and preparedness, with areas with a greater number of high-severity fire days needing greater attention, noted Wang.
He said that could include trying to reduce the risk in and around communities with so-called prescribed burns, which are meant to burn off underbrush and woody debris to reduce the risk of intense fires.