5C's Que Pasa

Why are people so stupid?  It’s 100F at 6:00PM and climbing.  Yes everyone,our A/C is on and has been since 10:00AM.  We really didn’t need it yesterday but we will for the next few days.  I have so many rants today that I don’t even know where to start.

We’ve all read in the news about the fellow in Georgia whose son, a mere toddler, was left in a car and died in the heat.  I’m not going into the details or the reasons behind this incident on July 3rd other than to say it was headline news here in Canada as well as in the US.  Did you also read about the three year old in South Carolina who was missing for only an hour and was found trapped, on the hottest day of the year, in the family car?  He died a few days later from heatstroke.  So why would a stupid father leave his two sons in a hot car on July 11th.  The boxes to the left show how the car interior can heat up in less than 13 minutes from 31.6C/97F to 45C/113F.  Idiot!  His children should be taken away from him.

This happened right here in Kelowna where I live just a few days ago.

This is our normal view, well actually the snow was finally melted by July 2nd.

This is our view today.

That is smoke you are seeing blocking our view.  Yesterday I mentioned that we awoke to 2 new fires.  Today we found out that one had been started by an abandoned campfire.  It was left unattended after midnight.  Do people no long have any brain matter?  A friend mentioned to me that the smoke is so bad in Jasper, one of the most beautiful spots in Alberta, that people are avoiding the area and going elsewhere.  People travel from all over the world to go to Jasper in the summer as well as to here in the Okanagan 👿    Sadly it gets worse.

Another two new fires.

The Mount Boucherie fire is just off of Hwy 97, the main highway coming into Kelowna on the West Side.  It is on the side of a mountain and will be difficult to deal with.  However the RCMP are having to deal with motorists who are stopping on the Hwy to take photos, creating even more problems.  Then there was the announcement  to boaters to please stay away from the helicopters dipping their buckets into the lake to pour on the fire. Is it not logical to stay aware so as to not impede putting out the fire?  Water is our one great commodity around here.  Colin & I have often said that we would just go into the lake if we were threatened.

Actually since I took that last shot, another fire has just been announced.  This one is near the Apex Mountain Guest Ranch, only 1 kilometre away. It is aggressive and moving quickly.  How many water tankers are available and helicopters with water buckets?  The province doesn’t have an unlimited amount, not to mention feet on the ground.  Who has started these fires?  Grrr!!!!!  Update, before I even finish this post….the fire has been deemed to be human caused and is still burning aggressively.  Other than lightening strikes ( which we don’t have right now ), all of these fires have to be caused by the stupidity of man.

OMG!! I just checked my online news and yet another fire.  Folks that is three fires within 2 hours.  Unbelievable!!  Is everything around us going to burn up.  This last fire is just off the Coquihalla Highway near the old toll booths.  It is over 40 hectares and is very aggressive, moving fast and too dangerous to fight. Direct from Castanet.net….

Fire Information Officer Melissa Klassen says a repel crew initially attended the fire in addition to air tankers and helicopters but they have now pulled all crews from the area as the fire was no longer safe for crews.

The Wildfire Management Branch is now keeping eyes on the fire from the sky.

“We are seeing aggressive fire behaviour, up to rank five. That means a rapidly spreading wildfire with a organized flame front creeping up into the trees, candling, and with a high flame height,” says Klassen.

All of this means that Colin will no longer be able to do any jobs until the smoke clears.  That is likely to be weeks and weeks unless we get a miracle and lots of rain.  As I type this we are thinking that this is the worst summer since the great fire of 2003, the year we moved here and had to evacuate the next day.

If you look at the second news line above, it mentions a fatal crash near Duck Lake. This photo taken from our patio shows how the traffic has been affected.

The three car crash occurred less than 1/2 mile to the right of this photo.  We can see the flashing red lights from the emergency vehicles attending not to mention hearing the many many sirens.  This is a stretch of highway that scares me to drive.  I turn right in less than a mile to come home.  Even though I drive the speed limit I am constantly being passed and honked at for diving too slow.  So what happened less than 90 minutes ago that one person died and five others were taken to hospital?  Were they site seeing and not paying attention to the road or was someone else speeding?  We will find out in the days to come.  Crazy drivers, always in a rush to get 2 seconds ahead of the next guy.  Sadly this incident has closed the highway in both directions for at least 4 hours, likely longer.  That means that if we had to go somewhere we are trapped here in our home. As a matter of fact, I only returned home less than 40 minutes before this accident occurred.  No way in, no way out.  Hopefully none of the over 1000 residents in this park will not need emergency care not to mention the over 1000 residents on the other side of the street.  How many people will not be able to get to our international airport to make their flights?  Folks are sitting in their vehicles with their cars running to keep the A/C going in our over 100F temperatures.   Can you imagine the firefighters with boots on the ground working in these inferno conditions?

It gets even worse.  People are going to loose their homes tonight.  An update on the last fire, the one off the Coquihalla Highway, again from Castanet news.

An evacuation alert has now been issued by the Thompson-Nicola Regional District for all residents near Murray Lake.

An aggressive over 45-hectare fire is just kilometres from Murray Lake and the wildfire poses an imminent threat to people and property.

Due to the potential danger to life and health, the Thompson-Nicola Regional District has issued an Evacuation Alert for the areas referred to in map below.

An evacuation alert has been issued to prepare you to evacuate your premises and property should it be found necessary.

"My whole yard was pink last night" she wrote. Thanks for sharing. I bet you didn't know that your photo would be the highlight of my day.

 

UPDATE….very very heartbroken to report that three people were killed in the car crash just across the lake from us and there are several others with unknown injuries.