Wildfire management in Saskatchewan is at its highest alert level because of the hot and dry weather across the province.
Steve Roberts, the executive director of wildfire management in Saskatchewan, provided a wildfire threat update on May 22, 2015.
“We’ll give you a general overview. We’re looking at across the province humidities less than 20 percent, temperatures 15 to 25 degrees and winds up to 30 kilometers an hour. Combined, those create fire hazards that are either high or extreme across almost all parts of the province. Because of that wildfire management is at prep level 5, our highest alert level for wildfires,” Roberts said.
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The extreme fire hazard looks to continue for at least the next four or five days with no precipitation in the weather forecast for much of the province.
A fire ban is in place for all provincial crown land, including provincial parks.
Southern Saskatchewan is not under fire ban, but individual municipalities could choose to institute one.
Duane McKay, Commissioner and Executive Director at Emergency Management and Fire Safety, said he’s concerned about volunteer fire management services handling the wildfires.
MaKay also said all but two of the 183 wildfires in Saskatchewan so far this year were caused by people, accidentally or intentionally.
