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Nova Scotia’s manager of fire protection says the Department of Natural Resources considers multiple factors — not just the fire weather index — when it updates the provincial burn restrictions map each day during wildfire season.
In an interview that aired Wednesday on CBC Radio’s Maritime Noon, Scott Tingley explained what goes into making the decision.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Nova Scotia’s burn restrictions map and the federal Canadian Wildland Fire Information System map sometimes appear to give conflicting information about wildfire risk. Can you explain the difference?
That fire weather index is a general statement for the conditions in the moment or that day.
But to set the burn restrictions, it’s a little more nuanced than that. And so there’s a few more factors that go into the decision making.
Queens County has actually gone through a period with less rain than other parts of the province, and we have weather stations across the province that collect hourly weather and they show that there’s been a lower cumulative rain in that area, and so we actually had an increase in what we call the buildup index — the overall availability of fuel to burn. And it was getting into a range of a very high and almost extreme.
Our concern and how it factors into the burn restrictions is that the fire weather index may be low on a particular day … someone could have a fire on that low day, and in two or three days if maybe they didn’t put that campfire out — because it’s harder to put out in those types of conditions — when we do get a dry day and it’s not put out properly, it could then take off as a wildfire. That’s what we call holdover potential, or fires that can smolder for a number of days when it’s that dry. So that particular reason, that part of the province was drier, and that’s why the restrictions were kept on a bit longer.
To what degree does Nova Scotia submit or share the data it has and provide it to Natural Resources Canada?
We collaborate all the time. Our data is available. They do draw from some other weather stations and there can be some discrepancy because they are using other sources, but generally we’re not too far off.
The burn restriction map is not necessarily what the fire weather index is on each day. It’ll fluctuate more on a daily basis. When we get to those drought and severe drought types of conditions, it takes that much more rain to change or reduce the restriction. Just like an overcast day with some humidity and no wind can significantly change the fire weather index. But that just means there might be less likelihood of a fire igniting and spreading that day, but if a fire does happen, it could still burn deep and hold over for a long time under a low fire weather index.
Am I understanding the Nova Scotia fire restrictions map correctly when it says between March 15 and Oct. 15, the map is always going to be red between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m.?
That’s right, yes. The best weather is available every day around 1:30 p.m., that’s just how the system is designed. We base our decision at that 1:30 p.m. weather and post it at 2 p.m.
Generally, [fire weather] conditions don’t improve throughout the day — they generally get warmer and drier.
The risk is if they start one [fire] in the morning and the conditions get worse, we’re going to have more fires kind of ongoing out there. If the conditions do get worse, the fires could escape. That was one of those decisions made many years ago to not permit them in the morning based on how we assess the conditions for a particular day.
Do you hear about people getting confused about the different fire maps and come to different conclusions?
Yes. Again the daily burn restriction website and phone number [855-564-2876] is meant to be the source of whether fires are permitted or not. There’s a plethora of information about fire conditions, fuel … all that factors into our decisions.
We’re trying to make the best balance between our parties, risk management, reducing the risk of wildfires, but also permitting activities when it’s safe.
Any time the map is red, we do get a lot of calls. But we get it the other way too when it’s green. We get it on the other end, people say it’s not restrictive enough. Sometimes it’s hard to articulate all we’re trying to consider.
How do you address concerns about the levels of transparency when it comes to making decisions on the fire restrictions map?
There is lots of information on our website. We encourage people to visit their local Natural Resources office and we have information in the form of brochures and things like that as well at those sites.
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