Castanet

The Little White Mountain fire has grown over four times in a couple hours, and now sits at 130 hectares.

Melissa Klassen, fire information officer, said air support services are having difficulties taking water from Okanagan Lake to fight the fire, due to boat traffic.

She is requesting boaters stay out of the lake, between the William R. Bennett Bridge and Okanagan Mountain Provincial Park, so the air tankers can safely get the water they require.

I get really tired of seeing these kind of complaints. Get out there and slap these boaters with a $20,000 fine or get one of the heli's to drop a bucket on each and every one of the intruding boaters. Pretty typical. Complain about it but do nothing about it. Those boaters should be very thankful Im not piloting the heli because your boat would be at the bottom of the lake.

Snickerdoodle wrote:Actually they did NOT! At least not all the parks were closed. I lived up on the last house going up to Little White back during the 2003 fire, and we would call the province and beg them to close Myra Canyon Park and they would not.

They did close certain area's like Knox Mtn and a few other smaller interface parks, but the larger areas they did not close them until after the fire. And even then there was a notice put up saying park closed due to unsafe conditions. So not concerned about future fire risk, just concerned about their butts getting sued if someone fell down a tree well or a dead standing tree fell on them.

Sorry Snicker...thought they did. Up here in The Rich..they did block of, well as much as plastic tape can do...access to trails..I spoke out of turn. If they didn't do up your way...they, in my opinion, should have.

Yeah we fought and argued with both local and provincial officials and begged them to do it, as we knew how tinder dry it was and how there was so many youth parties happening and off roaders... and then while the fire was happening and we were allowed bag we begged them, but nope nothing.

The only time I saw anything was on one day - we homeowners had a day pass to go home till a certain time, and there was a rent-a-cop standing at the base of the mountain access road, and thats because water trucks were going up full and there wasn't enough room for both them and lookiloos on the dirt access road. But thats was a total of one day.

Then when they finally "cleaned" up the fire lines they cleared - they were left as huge massive piles of logs and wood... almost like big huge bonfires ready to just be lit - and we knew again it was only a matter of time.

We still have friends that live up there, and they never thought they would have to go through this again.

Snickerdoodle wrote:Yeah we fought and argued with both local and provincial officials and begged them to do it, as we knew how tinder dry it was and how there was so many youth parties happening and off roaders... and then while the fire was happening and we were allowed bag we begged them, but nope nothing.

The only time I saw anything was on one day - we homeowners had a day pass to go home till a certain time, and there was a rent-a-cop standing at the base of the mountain access road, and thats because water trucks were going up full and there wasn't enough room for both them and lookiloos on the dirt access road. But thats was a total of one day.

Then when they finally "cleaned" up the fire lines they cleared - they were left as huge massive piles of logs and wood... almost like big huge bonfires ready to just be lit - and we knew again it was only a matter of time.

We still have friends that live up there, and they never thought they would have to go through this again.

Your worry and memoires are heartbreakingly palatable...there are others who have shared what you have been though...some again now. Why we have to go through this over and over, year after year is just not right. Those of us who live in the interface know that something should be done and yet no one, it seems, listens. I am sorry you carry this. We up her on The Rich do too. The back country should have been limited and or closed down long ago.

We will be posting lots more pics late tonight to early morning of the fire on our page.. we have a few locations we are going to and have some pretty high powered lenses. I posed the link to our page on page 6 of this topic and will try and submit as many pics as I can to our great castanet. Thanks every one who has checked our page and seen the photos we already have up.

here is the album including pics from tonight ....
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... 633&type=3

I don't have a view of the fire, how does it look today?

Snickerdoodle wrote:Yeah we fought and argued with both local and provincial officials and begged them to do it, as we knew how tinder dry it was and how there was so many youth parties happening and off roaders... and then while the fire was happening and we were allowed bag we begged them, but nope nothing.

The only time I saw anything was on one day - we homeowners had a day pass to go home till a certain time, and there was a rent-a-cop standing at the base of the mountain access road, and thats because water trucks were going up full and there wasn't enough room for both them and lookiloos on the dirt access road. But thats was a total of one day.

Then when they finally "cleaned" up the fire lines they cleared - they were left as huge massive piles of logs and wood... almost like big huge bonfires ready to just be lit - and we knew again it was only a matter of time.

We still have friends that live up there, and they never thought they would have to go through this again.

The thought of closing these big natural park areas is stupid. Just because you CHOSE to live next to the forest why should the entire human population suffer and not be able to go out into the mountain. Most are very careful. Penalize the ones who aren't. Not to mention look how many fires start at the side of the road - has nothing to do with people in the forest.

Every time there is a puff of smoke in the area everyone panics. I understand why but the chances of the Little White fire becoming an issue are very small. We are likely going to see rain soon and even if we don't it takes a perfect storm of conditions to have an unstoppable firestorm.

Live in your bubble and close the world off if you want but the rest of us will be out hiking.

gman313 wrote:The thought of closing these big natural park areas is stupid. Just because you CHOSE to live next to the forest why should the entire human population suffer and not be able to go out into the mountain. Most are very careful. Penalize the ones who aren't. Not to mention look how many fires start at the side of the road - has nothing to do with people in the forest.

Every time there is a puff of smoke in the area everyone panics. I understand why but the chances of the Little White fire becoming an issue are very small. We are likely going to see rain soon and even if we don't it takes a perfect storm of conditions to have an unstoppable firestorm.

Live in your bubble and close the world off if you want but the rest of us will be out hiking.

I think you're the one living in a bubble.

People losing their life possessions thanks to a careless human caused fire, would be the definition of suffering, not temporarily losing the privilege of going out on a mountain.

There's nothing stopping you from going to a local park, in the meantime, and there are plenty of them.

People keep proving time and time again that they can't, won't, or are just too stupid, to be trusted out in the bush, during a drought, so the easiest way to enforce safety precautions, is to ban everyone until it's once again safe to be out there.

It works in other places, so can just as easily work here.

Need to get your hiking fix, then suck it up and go hit the Greenway!

I find it more than mere coincidence, that three fires including the Little White one, all began on the same stretch of road.

They all began on the same stretch of road cause of a few idiots. The majority, the vast majority of hiker types are the ones who are going to be careful, take out their garbage etc. I couldn't help but notice the Rock Creek and Joe Rich fires this year were started on the side of the road, having nothing to do with the backcountry being open.

Let's also not forget OK Mountain Park fire was lightning caused and the area was long overdue for a good burn. Yes it was tragedy and yes it was very very terrible people lost their houses, I knew a few. But in that case, it was natures way.

Rain will help.

LoneWolf_53 wrote:People keep proving time and time again that they can't, won't, or are just too stupid, to be trusted out in the bush, during a drought, so the easiest way to enforce safety precautions, is to ban everyone until it's once again safe to be out there.

Good point there - people have been put at risk by stupidity and sometimes people have to be protected from fools.

By all this logic we should pretty well ban driving. I'm pretty sure we are all put at risk by stupid drivers too.

Latest Castanet news: "Despite the high visibility of the Little White Mountain fire from Kelowna, there was little growth to the blaze overnight."

Not just too sure what high visibility has to do with fire spread/growth. Hazard, RH, Temp, Wind, and Slope are factors in rate of fire spread.

gman313 wrote:By all this logic we should pretty well ban driving. I'm pretty sure we are all put at risk by stupid drivers too.

Bad drivers can be held accountable for their actions and to compare the devastation to life and property through forest fires as well as the funds and equipment to fight these fires isn't being realistic.