Atlantic Forestry July 2023

Trial by fire

On the last Sunday in May I’d planned to make some progress re-shingling the roof of the screened gazebo where we often eat supper in the summer. There had been some discussion of using corrugated steel this time, but because the structure is intended to have aesthetic as well as practical attributes, our final decision was to go with wood again – despite the fact that second clear cedar shingles are currently going for an eye-watering $60 per bundle. (Five inches to the weather, a bundle does about 25 square feet.)

Checking the forecast early that morning, I was glad to see it was going to be T-shirt weather – nice and warm, with steady breezes to keep the blackflies away. That turned out to be a bit of an understatement. The wind gusts were so strong, any shingle that wasn’t nailed down was apt to get blown away – and still it was scorching. By the time I climbed down the ladder and called it quits for the day, I had a bit of a headache from the heat, and there were news reports of a fast-spreading wildfire in the Tantallon and Hammonds Plains areas of suburban Halifax.

The fire resulted in about 16,000 people being evacuated – some just in the nick of time, as flames leapt across roads and cut off escape routes. By the time it was declared under control on June 4, the blaze had expanded to about 950 hectares, destroying more than 150 homes and a number of other structures.

It was reminiscent of previous fires in Halifax Regional Municipality – such as the one in 2009 that destroyed eight homes and burned 800 hectares in Spryfield, and one the previous year that destroyed only two homes but burned more than 1,900 hectares around Porters Lake and Lake Echo. Fire experts refer to such areas as part of the “wildland-urban interface” (WUI), where development abuts natural landscapes – resulting in increased fire risk, as well as greater potential for property damage and loss of life. In many cases, the residential sprawl that occurs there is designed to create the illusion of living in the wilderness, with houses tucked in along elegantly meandering streets or tranquil courts and cul-de-sacs. When these large lots are all sold, the roads may be pushed deeper into the surrounding woods. In addition to gobbling up a lot of land, this type of development often results in a considerable population living in the midst of an unmanaged forest, with just one way in or out.

As the Hammonds Plains fire was causing anxiety in Halifax, crews were also battling an old-fashioned wildfire in the Barrington Lake area, near the southwestern tip of Nova Scotia. This one required the evacuation of about 6,700 people – roughly half the population of Shelburne County – and it destroyed about 60 homes and cottages. It was finally declared under control on June 13, though mop-up work continued as firefighters identified and extinguished hot spots. In the end, it burned 23,525 hectares, making it the province’s worst wildfire in modern history – surpassing the 1976 fire at Porcupine Lake near Trafalgar, Guysborough County, which burned for six days and destroyed about 13,000 hectares. (However, there were likely even larger fires in the early period of European settlement and land clearing, especially in the dry spring of 1784. Over the ensuing decades, human-caused fires substantially altered the character of the province’s woodlands.)

Just a couple days before this year’s Barrington Lake fire started, 20 staff with the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources and Renewables (DNRR) set out from Halifax to help fight fires in the Northwest Territories. Such deployments occur regularly under the Canadian Mutual Aid Resource Sharing Agreement, with costs covered by the province or territory receiving assistance. Soon afterwards, Nova Scotia needed all the help it could get, welcoming crews from Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, the Department of National Defence, and also from the United States.

There were wildfires raging across the country, and more than 1,700 international firefighters came to assist – from Mexico, France, Spain, Portugal, Chile, Costa Rica, South Africa, and South Korea. By June 25 – still early in fire season – the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre announced that 2023 was already the country’s worst fire year, surpassing the 1989 record of 7,559,600 hectares burned. As this issue of AFR was going to print in early July, the national total was at 8.3 million hectares, and still growing. (Since 1990, the annual average has been about 2.5 million hectares.) The last I heard, there had been no fatalities, which is a testament to good management of response efforts – and also good luck. (During Portugal’s brutal 2017 wildfire season, more than 100 people were killed.)

This may not be the “new normal,” but it’s pretty clear that climate change will continue to bring frequent and severe wildfires globally, with huge costs in terms of property damage, lost timber supply, and increased carbon emissions – not to mention the threat to human safety. While we should continue to strengthen international networks for the sharing of resources, there are limitations. Firefighting is physically and mentally gruelling work that cannot be sustained month after month, so crews cannot be shuttled from country to country non-stop. Furthermore, there will be fires burning simultaneously in various places; sometimes there will be high demand not only for personnel, but also for equipment such as specialized aircraft.

There has been some discussion of the need to beef up our national capacity for wildfire suppression. According to a recent CBC report, Canada currently has about 106 water bombers that are “dispatch-ready,” but not all are considered top-notch. (Some are more than 50 years old.) Nova Scotia has none, though DNRR’s Air Services Division in Shubenacadie has a fleet of five helicopters that can be equipped with water buckets. De Havilland Canada plans to establish a plant in Calgary to build the new Canadair DHC-515 water bomber, with the first 24 planes destined for Europe a few years from now – but thus far none of the Canadian provinces have put in orders.

The federal government’s Fighting and Managing Wildfires in a Changing Climate Program provides support for training and hiring new firefighters in communities where the need is greatest, and it also includes an equipment fund that has a five-year budget of $256 million to support provinces and territories in procuring specialized gear. After the 2023 fire season, we should expect some investments on this front.

Then there’s the matter of reducing the incidence of forest fires. Especially in a province such as Nova Scotia, where only about three percent of fires are started by lightning, great improvements could be made simply by addressing carelessness related to campfires, burning brush, tossed butts or roaches, and the recreational use of motorized vehicles.

There are also implications for forest management. The “borealization” of woodlands in this region has likely increased our susceptibility to fire. Broadly speaking, deciduous trees are less fire-prone than conifers, and healthy mixed stands may have less deadwood resulting from pests, disease, and blowdown. On the other hand, some would argue that intensive management of softwood plantations removes much of the fuel load. There’s no magic bullet for reducing fire risk. With some places in Canada experiencing air quality as bad as Delhi or Beijing, and smoke drifting down to major U.S. cities (and even riding the jet stream to Western Europe), what’s important is that our forests be recognized as an asset rather than a liability. (Incidentally, my cedar roof looks pretty sharp, and the old shingles are entirely reusable as kindling for the woodstove.) DL