VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA (AP) – The wildfire situation showed some improvement in British Columbia on Sunday, with more people being allowed to return home, but blazes continued to threaten communities farther north in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
Hot temperatures and winds expected to gust to up to 40kph were fanning flames around the Northwest Territories town of Hay River, on the south shore of Great Slave Lake. The blaze, which has burned across 4,000 square kilometres, was about a kilometre west of the town’s airport and 1.5 kilometre from the town centre.
“These conditions are supportive of the potential for severe fire activity,” Mike Westwick, a fire information officer for the Northwest Territories government, said in a telephone interview. “We’ve got a big team of firefighters on the ground who are doing everything they can to prevent that eventuality.”
