Helping Residents Prepare for Fire Season

CSRD FireSmart Reps Sophie Randall (left) with Ember the FireSmart Fox & Amanda Ullman

(Photos by Jerre Paquette).

By Jerre Paquette

The South Shuswap Chamber of Commerce offered an extended FireSmart presentation on June 8 at the Sorrento Community Hall that proved to be a remarkable opportunity for attending participants to have all their questions answered concerning fire season preparedness, available water rescue services, and “keeping wildlife wild and communities safe.”

It was therefore a reminder that protecting communities from the ravage of forest fires in the Shuswap requires an orchestration of services, equipment, knowledge, and personal commitment.

And that orchestration includes the antics of Ember the FireSmart Fox (replacing Smokey the Bear). Ember, thanks to Chris Ross, was in attendance, serving to keep the day fun for kids and for the kid in each of us—and likely to make it clear that taking smart action is the new name of the fire awareness game; his name alone serves to make us aware that it is not just the roaring flames that threaten us, but those embers that stay hot for months, lying in wait.

Sophie Randell and Amanda Ullman, both of whom started out as young volunteers, subsequently committed their professional lives to fighting fires in the Shuswap. They were outstanding in patiently, helpfully explaining what each of us can do to keep ourselves and our homes safe during the fire season and beyond.

Wes Simons, Rob Sutherland, Linda Burnell, Marie Gray, and Doug Wasylenski of the Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue (RCMSAR) Station 106 Shuswap offered dramatic videos and personal stories of their rescue program.

Although their focus is water safety, they were central in last year’s combined rescue efforts of people on the north shore of the Shuswap who found themselves unable to flee the approaching flames by car. RCMSAR ferried them all across the lake to Blind Bay and followed up by supplying necessary medical and food supplies.

Rob Sutherland (Station Leader) outlined the safety first program they offer to grade school children (‘Bobbie’ is their hero), the floatation devices they make available to all boaters (use & return at end of day), and a moving tale of how a man saved a child who fell off a bridge into cold water by tossing him a “Red Ring” floatation device that the team had stationed on the bridge just the day before the incident.

And perhaps to acknowledge what ‘Smokey’ offered us over the many years of his role in fire prevention, Olivia Lemke, a WildSafeBC Columbia Shuswap representative, was present to remind us that our wildlife has to be part of our concern particularly during the fire season when they, too, are doing their best to flee the flames.

She certainly helped garner considerable respect for our Grizzly bears as she presented a to-scale paw print, perhaps of a fleeing bear.

RCMSAR with Bobbie the Rescue Boat

Olivia Lemke (WildSafeBC) speaks with Karen Brown (SS Chamber of Commerce)