BANFF – Hot on the heels of a record-breaking wildfire season in Canada in 2023, the Town of Banff plans to host a community forum this year to help ease residents’ fears over wildfire threats to town.
The plan for the wildfire forum also falls in line with findings in the 2023 community social assessment, which found residents were more anxious over the threat of wildlife than ever before, with fears of not being able to evacuate, especially for those in the Middle Springs area.
The wildfire forum was initially on the books for 2025, but Coun. Barb Pelham was successful in convincing most of her council colleagues to spend the $8,300 in order to host the wildfire forum this year instead.
“I want to bring this forward in response to listening to the community’s concerns over evacuating, specifically in regards to wildfire,” she said.
“It is clear that this is a concern that extends throughout the community.”
Banff hosted a wildfire forum in 2021, which included discussion and information about the latest research on wildfire risk, Banff’s wildfire response plans, and what people in the community needed to know and do to be ready for wildfires.
Currently, the Town of Banff is working with a contractor, Alpine Precision, to reduce the wildfire risk in the Middle Springs neighbourhood on Sulphur Mountain.
From January through April, crews are cutting and thinning trees, removing or burning logs, deadfall, and dead-standing trees.
The FireSmart work involves chainsaw cutting to prune and remove lower branches of coniferous trees, and burn piles, between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m..
“Work such as burning only proceeds each day after assessment of weather and wind conditions, and Parks Canada approval,” said the Town of Banff notice.
In addition, Parks Canada fire crews are also selectively logging trees and removing branches, logs and shrubs behind the Banff administration grounds now through until Feb. 15.
In Canada in 2023, more than 6,100 fires burned a record-breaking 17.5 million hectares, fuelled by record-high temperatures and widespread drought conditions across much of the country.
The area more than double the 1989 wildfire record. Typically, an average of 2.5 million hectares of land is burned in Canada every year.
Unlike previous years, the 2023 fires were widespread from the West Coast to the Atlantic provinces and the North, and by mid-July, there were 29 so-called mega-fires, each burning 100,000 hectares.
For 2023, there were 25 wildfires in Banff, Yoho and Kootenay national parks, burning a total of 346.5 hectares – of which 307 hectares were attributed to the lightning-sparked Mitchell Ridge wildfire in Kootenay.
In Banff National Park, between August 3 and Sept. 15, there was one lightning-caused fire at Castle Mountain, and three illegal campfires detected in the park.
