The BC Wildfire Service says the province’s largest forest fire hasn’t moved any nearer to major roads or communities in the last five days.
The 868 square kilometre Shovel Lake fire is no closer to Fort St. James. It is 14.5 km from the furthest eastern point of the fire to Highway 27, but the main eastern flank of the fire is still between 20 km-23 km away from Highway 27.
The fire perimeter is 5.3 km northeast of Highway 16 on the furthest western tip, 5.7 km north of Highway 16 near Endako, and 7.25km
north of Highway 16 near Fort Fraser where the main eastern flank of the fire runs.
The most activity and growth on the fire Tuesday, about 450 hectares, was in the northwest of the fire between Taltapin Lake and Hannay
Lake.
Thick smoke continued to hamper aircraft with no attacks from the air due to visibility concerns Tuesday. To take advantage of any visibility windows, helicopters for this fire and the Island Lake wildfire have been placed in Fort St. James and Burns Lake.
While the Shovel Lake blaze hasn’t moved any closer to Fort St. James, wind gusts are expected to pick up with prevailing 15 km/hr from the southwest and possible gusts up to 30 km/hr between Tuesday night and Thursday afternoon.
