KAMLOOPS THIS WEEK TUESDAY
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JULY 7, 2015 | Volume 28 No. 81
TODAY’S WEATHER
Sunny and hot High 36 C Low 19 C
DAY THE MUSIC DIED
SEEKING MORE MEDALS
Attack on downtown piano
Sultana Frizell looks to capture gold at Pan Ams
A11
A10
Millions for water-intake projects
Red fire retardant stains the underside of a fire bomber as it returns to Kamloops Airport following a weekend mission. Through Sunday, there have been 865 wildfires in B.C. that have burned 221,000 hectares. The 10-year average is 1,847 fires and 115,000 hectares burned per year. Last year in the province, 1,484 wildfires burned 369,000 hectares. The closest blaze to Kamloops is the 30-hectare Venables Valley fire south of Ashcroft. ALLEN DOUGLAS/KTW
ANDREA KLASSEN
STAFF REPORTER
andrea@kamloopsthisweek.com
Highway 33 in the Okanagan were also under evacuation order. Within the Kamloops fire region, the busiest centre is the Penticton zone, where three of six fires of note are located. While the Thompson and North Thompson valleys have not seen any significant forest fires, despite weeks of record heat and lack of rain, there have been 169 fires in the larger fire centre so far this year. That’s up from the average of 136. Nearly 3,500 hectares have been burned, compared to the 1,400-hectare norm in the first week of July. The Cisco fire, at 2,200 hectares, is responsible for much of the total. Adams said the fire department hopes to better deploy its resources on local spot fires with a new system brought in last year.
A splash of cash from the federal and provincial governments has knocked down the price of an emergency water intake for the City of Kamloops by about two-thirds. Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo Conservative MP Cathy McLeod and city MLAs Terry Lake and Todd Stone announced yesterday their governments will contribute more than $6 million for the intake on the North Thompson River. Residents in Black Pines in the ThompsonNicola Regional District will also get just under $450,000 from each level of government for a new intake for their community water system. The cash comes from Small Communities Fund, a program in which the feds, the province and the local community each chip in an equal amount for infrastructure projects. The Kamloops project, estimated at $9 million, is among the largest to be funded in B.C. during this grant cycle. The city will spend $3 million. Mayor Peter Milobar said the secondary intake can keep the city serviced with water in the event of a train derailment or other disaster that could contaminate the city’s regular water supply from the South Thompson river. Milobar said any contamination between the city and the Shuswap could leave the community without water, forcing it to truck in drinking water and leaving residents unable to flush toilets. “It only takes an incident to happen to say, ‘Why didn’t we think about this?’” Milobar said. The intake will be built at 720 Yates Rd. in Westsyde, with construction to start in 2016.
See AIR QUALITY, A5
See NEW VOTE, A4
KAMLOOPS SITTING IN A RING OF FIRE CAM FORTEMS
STAFF REPORTER
cam@kamloopsthisweek.com
The city and valley remain in the centre of a ring of fire as hot and dry conditions have crews battling large blazes that threaten homes and forests across B.C. “Everyone is on a sense of alert,” said Mike Adams, deputy chief of Kamloops Fire Rescue. Much of the region is moving up the dial to high or extreme risk of wildfire. In the wider Kamloops Fire Centre, blazes have been ignited in the Fraser Canyon and Okanagan, where the threat forced evacuation of a small number of homes. A fire on the weekend south of Ashcroft forced relocation for people gathered in the Venables Valley for a local music festival. That fire was most recently estimated at
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about 30 hectares. Another small fire is burning in an area southwest of Barriere, but no structures are under threat. There are six wildfires of note burning in the region, which extends as far south as the U.S. border. The largest remains the Cisco fire near Lytton, which has produced intermittent smoke in the valley for weeks, but is now 95 per cent contained. “We won’t be able to wrap up the entire perimeter,” said fire information officer Kayla Pepper. The remaining five per cent is in rocky alpine area. It will be allowed to creep up and be snuffed out as it reaches snowy areas. The Coastal and Northwest fire centres are the busiest in the province, with 100 homes in Port Hardy evacuated due to threat. A small number of houses off
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