It has been a busier year than usual so far for local fire departments.
In his latest report, North Battleford Fire Department chief Lindsay Holm reported a “larger number of fires” this year compared to last. His report, presented Monday, showed six structure fires in the city for the year through the end of March, with one of those fires happening in March.
That is double the number of structure fires for the same period last year. Five are residential fires; one was a commercial fire.
Holm also reported Monday that the number would go up in the next report: with one residential fire on Saturday morning, and another again earlier on Monday morning.
When asked why there were so many fires, Holm responded that he couldn’t pinpoint anything to suggest they were “anything but unexpected.”
During the course on the fire investigations, there was “nothing that would indicate any kind of trends that I could identify that would lead me to believe otherwise,” said Holm.
Holm also noted the city is still under a fire ban, issued April 6. Holm noted there was a high amount of overgrown grass growth, which was very dry above ground. He said he would leave the fire ban in place until conditions in the city improve, and that is not likely until they receive a substantial rainfall.
There have been a number of major fires in the Battlefords area in recent months that fire departments have had to respond to. The town of Battleford had to deal with two major structure fires during the winter months: one at the Battleford Esso car wash and another at a local residence.
Most recently, the R.M. of Meota fire department had to spend several hours putting out a major grassfire on Sunday afternoon, located just north of an oil steam plant.
There was a full response from Meota fire department as well as assistance from the R.M. of North Battleford fire department, who provided a water truck on scene.
In the aftermath, a fire ban has been put in place in the R.M. of Meota. A burning ban has been in place for the R.M. of North Battleford since April 7.
