Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is in British Columbia on Friday meeting with people involved in the fight against what he has called “apocalyptic” wildfires still burning across the province.
The visit, listed on his public itinerary, comes a day after officials announced City of Kelowna residents were given the go-ahead to return home.
Their evacuation was the result of multiple fires over the past week that have carved a path of destruction through the Central Okanagan. However, orders still remain in effect for those in other communities including West Kelowna and the Westbank First Nation, which Trudeau visited earlier in the day.
BC Wildfire said that the fires in Lake Country and Kelowna are now “held,” meaning they are considered unlikely to spread beyond the predetermined boundaries established under current conditions.
Wildfires continue to rage across much of the province, with about 369 burning as of Thursday night, including 14 of note. All previous records for the number of hectares burned have been shattered with more than 1.76 million this year as of Aug. 23.
Earlier this week, Trudeau said the wildfires in both B.C. and the Northwest Territories have caused “apocalyptic devastation.” A state of emergency has been declared in B.C, with all residents of the N.W.T. capital of Yellowknife having been ordered to evacuate due to an encroaching wildfire.
Military assets have also been deployed to B.C. and were helping with evacuations, staging and other logistical tasks.
The blazes were a “pressing concern” for Trudeau and his ministers as they gathered for a three-day cabinet retreat in Prince Edward Island. That meeting came more than halfway through Canada’s worst wildfire season so far.
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