B.C. wildfire starts cool in 'strange' season, but remain vigilant, say officials

The number of wildfires sparked this year inB.C. is far below the number by this time last summer, but fire officials are warning people to remain vigilant there's a hot dry stretch ahead.

"It's given us a chance to catch our breath, catch up on training, on project work, a lot of things we could be doing outside of fire response mode," saidKevinSkrepnek, the province's chief fire information officer.

"But given the weather forecast, we're preparing,ready to be at full tilt once we see thosefires pop up," he said.

Since the start of the wildfire season onApril 1 untilJuly 27there have been 591 wildfires in B.C this year.

During thatsame periodin 2015 more than 1300 fires were reported.

Fire danger across most of the province currently ranges from low to moderate.

The slow start tosummerthat some dubbed as "Juneuary" has hadits benefits saidSkrepnek.

"We are below average for the number of fires we've responded to this year," he said.

"We've had some unseasonably cool weather and quite a bit morerain in most parts of the province."

In April,intense wildfires sparkedupunusually earlyin the Northeast of the provincebut in the last two months, he saidit has been "relatively quiet" making it a "strange" fireseason.

In his memory 2011 was the last year he recalls such a quiet fire season with only 653 counted by fire season's end in the fall.

Fire safety

Despite the calm, he's warning the public not to becomecomplacent particularly as the mercury rises.

"We are seeing much more seasonal conditions ... and looking at the forecast we expect that's going to continue for theforeseeable future."

Heading into the long weekend, whenmorepeople are expected to be out in thebackcountry,he's reminding campers of fire safety guidelines.

Campfires are allowed across the province as of right now but he says it must be kept small ahalf-metre by half-metre.

He says users should ensure it is alwayscontained, supervised andfully extinguished before leaving a site.

The majority of the wildfires from this year have been human-causedbut Skrepnek says that ratio is expected to tip as August tends to bring more lightning strikes.