Prince George fire crews have responded to eleven fires (including four in as many days) over the past month, leading some to wonder what’s going on in the northern capital.
Ten were related to structures while the other one was a vehicle fire.
Fire Chief, John Iverson told MyPGNow.com the majority of the blazes are driven by accidental causes.
“It’s just one of those unique things about this type of business where these fires can come in bunches and then it will be quiet for a couple of weeks at a time and then we’ll get a couple more or it will be very quiet.”
“There is no real way of predicting these things.”
Iverson states there isn’t anything directly related to all the fires.
“The incidents we have attended have been spread out throughout the city where there is no real connection that I can see with anything other than I would ask people to be very careful.”
With the weather getting warmer, the local fire chief reminds residents to avoid doing one thing.
“Don’t burn your grass. We still get calls of people burning their grass and not only is it in contravention of the fire bylaw it does create problems and it has caused some significant fire losses.”
However, May is traditionally a busy month for PG firefighters.
“With wildland fires and grass fires, this May has been a little bit cooler and that has helped us and that would be one of the trends I have seen this year is the cooler weather, not everybody likes it but it’s good for a lot of the work we do.”
Iverson said the short-term numbers are a little higher than normal but when comparing it to the calendar year, there hasn’t been a major increase.
He adds the department gets a wide-range of calls throughout the year including, human-caused fires, careless use of smoking materials as well as cooking fires.
Something going on in the Prince George area you think people should know about?
Send us a news tip by emailing [email protected].
