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Aug. 25: No new growth on Elephant Hill fire today

Crews continue to work on containment lines
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8:45 p.m. update: There was no new growth on the Elephant Hill fire today, says Fire Information Officer Claire Allen.

“This is primarily from the work the fire crews are doing in terms of suppression activities as well as the rain and cooler temperatures that we did have yesterday and today overall — cooler temperatures and much damper conditions on the fire.”

She says crews are continuing work to put in containment lines assisted by heavy equipment.

“We do have crews all along the fire. We do have crews that are conducting mop up in some of the quieter areas of the fire so along the west and south sides of the fire and then primarily crews are doing the containment line and direct attacks as they are able along the east side — so the Battle Creek area, and then south of Hihium Lake and then moving along that east side to the north. Crews are working in the Young Lake area and to the north east of Young Lake, as well as working with heavy equipment all along that north flank of the fire to put in the containment line,” she says.

Bombers were working in the north part of the fire today and contingency lines are also being constructed as a back up plan.

“Crews are working on that north west side of the fire to the south of Green Lake, that’s north of Hutchinson Lake and working to tie the containment line in along that way and that line is working east, whereas the other line is working north and west so they will meet over top of the fire in order to contain it.”

Allen says crews are estimating that completion of the lines should be done by Sunday.

“With the warm weather returning, we’re hoping to really get that line in place before we see any significant stretches of hot, dry weather or any return to some gusty winds.”

She says meteorologists are predicting a return to drier weather.

“Things are going to dry out again quite quickly. Tomorrow is expected to be probably the last significant day of continued damp forest fuels along the the fire there. Again, we are working to capitalize that, as we can, to get crews to do direct attack, mop up and hose lay along the fire as well as to construct guard with heavy equipment.”

Crew members are trained to decide where best to place containment lines.

“That is based on fuel type topography, any adjacent values and of course how fast the fire is moving and where the fire perimeter is itself,” she says.

“Wherever possible we like to tie in with existing features so whether that is widening road systems that might be in the area, or tying into any kind of lake or wetland feature or even rocky areas where they is no flammable forest fuels that expedites the work we are doing and helps lessen the long term impact of building containment lines on the landscape.”

Hand guards are done usually for smaller fires, in more ecologically sensitive areas or in areas difficult to access by machinery.

“With both machine and hand guard the idea is to remove fuel and create what looks like a road or a barrier around a fire, completely fuel free and dug down to the mineral soil so there is no flammable forest material left over,” says Allen.

“When it comes to machine what we are seeing on the fire is groups of heavy equipment that go through — so fellers, bunchers, skidders, dozers excavators that work to create [a line] generally 15-20 m in width but sometimes larger and sometimes smaller than that, and digging down a blade’s width, which is about 3.3 m down to that mineral soil. So, when the fire is moving along, having that fuel free barrier there, as long as the fire doesn’t have anything to move into it’s not going to move forward.

“The real point of those is to build a buffer between what is burning and the green fuels on the other side in order to stop forward progression.”

She says the lines can be used to contuct controlled ignitions off of them, as well as can be reinforced through fire retardant or helicopter bucketing

“It is definately one of our strongest firefighting tools especially on a fire as large as this where direct attack isnt always effective and definately isn’t always safe.”

Original story: The Elephant Hill fire is now estimated at 175,185 hectares but there has been no growth in the last 24 hours, says Fire Information Officer Claire Allen.

“That’s indicative of growth we had earlier this week.”

Yesterday morning there was a lot of air tanker action in the Young Lake and Green Lake areas and by about mid-morning, a thunderstorm rolled in, but there was no growth to the perimeter during that time, according to Allen. After that, they were granted quite a bit of reprieve with some thundershowers, including some lightning, but with a good amount of rain, she says.

“Primarily in the north part, which has been the most active area of the fire, reported upwards of 8 to 10 mm of precipitation. That really gave us a bit of a break and allowed our crews and heavy equipment to make the most of it and get some really strong containment lines in place.”

This morning crews are picking up on the progress made yesterday with the assistance of heavy equipment and air support and look to get an upper hand on the fire while the cool conditions persist.

There are now about 332 firefighters working on the fire, according to the BC Wildfire Service. Allen says the number dropped because some firefighters ran into the 14 operational limit, forcing them to take time off. She adds that working 12 to 14 hours per day is very taxing on firefighters.

“We have requested additional crews as they are available and they’re either on route or should be shortly as we’re able to get them in. The fire still remains the number one priority in the province and we do have a lot of out of province resources.”

They’re still meeting objectives despite the smaller numbers and will be looking to get the numbers back up as they’re able to, says Allen.

In the Cache Creek area crews are making really good progress in terms of mop up, says Allen.

“We had an infrared heat scan in the area around the highway corridor. So we’ll be assessing any remaining activity in those areas that seem a bit quieter but still have some lingering fire behaviour really deep in the subsurface area.