Environment Canada counted 26,000 lightning strikes in B.C. Interior Thursday night

KAMLOOPS — A lightning storm that swept through the southern Interior Thursday evening (July 8) has officials worrying about new fire starts.

Environment Canada’s Doug Lundquist says multiple storm systems zapped the ground with as many as 26,000 lightning strikes.

“It was a busy day — not uncharacteristic for summer, but what concerns me is that we came out of the extraordinary heat and also dryness,” Lundquist told CFJC Today.

“It did rain with a few of these (storm cells) — we got about 10 millimetres in Princeton and 15 in Lillooet — but it was only spotty, the rain, and even where it does rain, you can get lightning on the edge of the clouds,” he continued. “Definitely a concern for the wildfire service.”

The B.C. Wildfire Service says it will have a better idea of the impact of the storm in the coming days as holdover fires begin to pop up.

Lundquist says the dry conditions early in the season are reminiscent of one of the worst fire seasons in recent memory, experienced by the B.C. Interior in 2003.

“It was dry like that and the thing is, this year, the fires and smoke seem to be starting earlier. This is just subjective, but it seems to be coming a lot earlier,” Lundquist said. “What isn’t subjective is the heat we had at the end of June — I’ve never seen that in my career before. That’s something that we never saw in 2003.”

After unsettled conditions this week, Environment Canada’s forecast now calls for sunshine and summer heat for at least the next week. Lundquist says the heat will be more like what the Kamloops area is used to in the middle of summer.

“It’s so warm that I wouldn’t be surprised if, for a couple of days — two or three days maybe early next week, it’s almost there already — we might have to put the heat warning back out,” he said. “I want to really caution that it’s not like what we saw before Canada Day.”

Lundquist reminds residents to check on loved ones — both for heat impacts and impacts of smoke blanketing the area.

“Our noses are pretty sensors in themselves for air quality and we can feel how it affects our bodies. People really should pay attention to that,” he said. “It’s good to get exercise and get out and about, but not when conditions are the worst for air quality.”