Summer of Fire

July 23, 2009 photog blogs

We returned from our Kelowna deployment late Tuesday. Now we again find ourselves preparing Chopper 9 to go into yet another fire. Yes the fire season is firmly upon us. This time we are preparing to fly to the town of Lilooet British Columbia. A small fire there has grown to a large fire and evacuations could be imminant.

Word also this morning that a fire that we had flown on earlier this week near Terrace Mountain has grown to be a monster. There are now 2200 people in a nearby town on evacuation order. We still have crews on the ground in the area but the NOTAM has been modified to 12000 ft above and 5 mile around the fire.

The mission to Lilooet will not involve us overnighting at this point.
There is lightning in the forecast, this could be the mother of all fire seasons.