A serious grass fire that happened near the Four Pillars Health and Wellness Retreat Centre, formerly Metochos Ministries Bible Camp on April 16, started with a little spark.
The property owner was cutting the lawn with a tractor when some of the lawn clippings had migrated up into the engine compartment onto the exhaust manifold. The original ignition occurred and then dropped down onto the grass.
The Estevan Fire Rescue Services (EFRS) spend over six hours trying to get the fire under control. Fortunately, they managed to contain the fire early into the accident and no injuries, no loss of property or livestock occurred as a result.
“The wind direction had changed at that time to our favour taking the fire away from the property, so crews were able to get in there and extinguish the front lines right around the property itself,” said Fire Chief Dale Feser.
However, the changing wind and the fire location turned the operation into a real challenge.
“As far as accessibility goes, it was one of the challenges that we had out there. We had some very wet, rocky terrain that we were going through… The wind direction played a huge role as well. It changed direction … seven times during this operation. The leading edge of the fire was changing several times, so we had to regroup and reorganize,” said Feser.
The RM of Estevan brought graders and a water truck to assist with the fire, however, for some of the bigger machines it was almost impossible to get through the scene.
“Some of the larger equipment was just having a hard time negotiating the terrain, it was so soft and we were getting stuck in there. So we had to make sure that we are protecting those assets and extinguishing the fire around them, recovering them from their stuck position and getting them mobile again,” said Feser.
On top of other challenges, a tire blew on a fire truck. The tire business located west if the city limits was able to get to the scene quickly and fix the problem before the machine had any more damage.
The Midale Fire Department was also called on scene to assist with the operation.
“We would like to thank the Midale Fire Department… They joined the Estevan crews for additional assistance, manpower resources and equipment for suppression. We had EMO (emergency measures organization) safety co-ordinator Helen Fornwald form the City of Estevan assisting us by bringing out food and refreshments and water for the suppression crews. It was just a really good day as far as communication and teamwork of multiple agencies on site trying to bring this under control,” said Feser.
Firefighters also had an opportunity to observe a relatively rare condition called “firenado.”
“The cold wind coming off of the lake coming up and meeting the very warm and hot temperature winds that wildland fire produces itself, that’s where we’ve seen a few ‘firenado’ situations develop during the scene there,” said Feser.
One of the stronger “firenados” lasted about two minutes and was moving at an approximate speed of 20 kilometres an hour.
“There is really not much you can do in that particular type of situation other than inform all of the people, fire suppression staff on site, to stay out of its way, track its position and put out any of the spot fires that may arise as a result of that particular condition,” said Feser.
At the times the fire was moving very quickly, and with the wind changing directions sometimes it was faster than fire crews could move especially due to the topography of the land.
The fire burned about 200 acres of pastureland.
The other large grass fire came April 19, about two kilometres south of Hirsch. Adrian Bachorcik, the chief of the Bienfait Fire Department, said that it was the largest he has seen in the department’s immediate response area for some time.
Members of the Bienfait, Frobisher, Estevan and Portal fire departments were called to the fire Friday at 1:15 p.m. The Estevan department was called through a mutual aid call.
Bachorcik estimates that about 25-30 firefighters were dispatched to the blaze. Crews spent nearly four hours at the scene, as it took time to get the assets that they need in place, and to extinguish such a large blaze.
“When we initially showed up for the response, it had already travelled a mile,” said Bachorcik. “And then we dispatched crews from there to suppress the fire.”
The amount of acres affected is not yet known.
He believes it started from hay bales.
“From what I heard from neighbours and other people that were talking at the scene, it was hay bales,” he said.
It’s believed the bales were lit on fire a few days earlier, when there wasn’t much wind. They were likely still smoldering or partially burning when the winds kicked up and caused the fire to spread.
“It was the right conditions for something to happen,” Bachorcik said.
Bachorcik said the wind was the biggest reason the fire spread so quickly, as it gusted up to 50-60 kilometres an hour.
“It was a bad timing for that fire to happen, especially with how the winds were, and how they were travelling, too,” said Bachorcik.
Wind speeds were a bigger challenge than dry moisture conditions, as the provincial fire risk map doesn’t indicate an extreme risk at this time.
Bachorcik said the firefighters who responded from the different departments did a good job of working together.
With warmer weather settling down in the region, Feser reminded citizens to be very cautious while driving on dry grass.
“Once you have some very long, dense, dry vegetation we definitely have to make sure that we are taking care, even when we are driving our private vehicles, whether it be a pick-up truck or even an ATV (all-terrain vehicle), four-wheeler, side-by-side. Often times what we see is that these guys trying to enjoy some of these all-terrain vehicles but their exhausts are extremely hot and once they come into contact with the vegetation it provides an ignition source. A lot of times we are responding to events that have started just because of vehicle’s hot exhaust,” said Feser.
