Stranded hikers barely escape wildfire

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The pilot and his passenger — a wildfire professional — landed on top of Mount Bruce, and helped get the three hikers into the helicopter. They told the trio they could take them back to Invermere, or back to their car. As the helicopter flew down and Randle got a glimpse of the blaze, she was stunned at how swiftly and fiercely the flames and smoke and expanded.

“They said they figured that the fire wouldn’t reach our car for at least another 10 minutes. I began to think tling the Horsethief Creek fire and two other nearby wildfires — the Yearling Creek fires and Mia Creek fire — for the first week they were burning, including more than 40 Interagency Hotshot Crew wildland firefighters from south of the border. The elite Hotshot firefighters were working on the Horsethief Creek, Yearling Creek and Mia Creek fires until Monday, July 31.

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As of Pioneer press deadline on Tuesday, Aug. 1, a total of 73 firefighters remain working on the three fires (which are collectively known as the Horsethief Complex) along with 10 helicopters and 11 pieces of heavy equipment.

On Monday, July 31 multiple Invermere residents called the Pioneer, saying that smoke plumes were more visible from town that they has been previously. In addition on July 31, the Pioneer received several calls from residents in both Invermere and Radium reporting ash flakes from the fire floating down in those communities.

Horsethief Complex incident commander Tom Flanagan posted a video update on Monday July 31 taking viewers on a fly over of the Horsethief Creek wildfire.

“Our initial response was to contain to the east (the direction of the Toby Benches and Lake Lillian) and to the north side (the direction of Horsethief Forest Service Road) of the complex,” said Flanagan in the video. “We did this by putting in (a) handline using existing road and machine guards, using some hand ignitions to bring the fire to the guard lines.”

This was all in an effort to tie off the fire, and in so doing to protect the heavily populated areas to the east (including the areas subject to the evacuation order and alert, as well as Invermere).

Flanagan explained that the on the night of Sunday, July 30, on the west side of the blaze, the fire jumped and ran uphill on the western slope of Mount Bruce.

“It’s just a continuous stream of (forest) fuels with no other value than just timber,” he said, as the video shows footage of the forested western slope of Mount Bruce burning.

On the eastern flank of the fire “the higher we go, you start to run into much smaller (forest) fuel type, sparser (forest) fuels all the way up to the rocks to the north,” said Flanagan.

Panorama Mountain Resort is located to the south of about how I am the only person in my house with a car, and how if there is an evacuation order we might really need the car. So we asked to go back to the car,” said Randle.

After dropping the hikers off, the helicopter pilot remained hovering above the car for some time, making sure it got safely down the road. The trio drove down, keeping a wary eye on the flames and smoke further up the slope, returning back to Invermere in haste.

“I was so relieved, first to see the helicopter, and then to get back to town. It was quite a day,” said Randle. the fire “and with our incoming forecast of strictly south winds, at this time there is no threat to Panorama or the village,” he adds.

She later posted the videos and photos she’d taken on her Instagram account and Facebook page. The next day she returned to work (at Valhalla Pure Outfitters) and found her posts had turned her into an overnight social media celebrity.

“I kept getting message from national news organizations wanting to talk to me, and my parents had been getting all kinds of messages too. It was pretty crazy,” said Randle.

The Horsethief Creek wildfire began burning on Monday, July 24 and prompted an evacuation order and an evacuation alert. On Sunday, July 30 the alert was rescinded and all properties except one under the evacuation order were downgraded to an evacuation alert.

The fire will be burning for weeks to come, outlined Flanagan.

“Communities over the next few weeks definitely will see continuous smoke,” he said.

If there is a temperature inversion (which is not uncommon in the Columbia Valley in late summer and early fall) low-lying smoke in the morning could well be present, outlined Flanagan.

“This (the wildfire and the smoke) is going to be (a) natural part of our environment for the next several weeks until we get some weather (sustained rain or other precipitation),” concluded Flanagan.

The Yearling Creek fire is estimated at 1,304 hecatres in size, and Nipika Mountain Resort and the Cross River Canyon Recreation Site, Cross River Education and Retreat Centre and Cross Rive Forest Service Road remain under evacuation order as a result of that fire.

The Mia Creek fire is estimated at 881 hectares in size.

For the latest status of all wildfires in BC, visit www. bcwildfire.ca.

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