Unusual wildfire activity across Quebec
Kai Richer was reading by the shoreline of her family cottage in Val-des-Bois, Que. on Sunday afternoon when she heard a plane rumbling overhead.
The plane turned out to be a water bomber. It was followed by a few more, all making their way to suppress a forest fire that had broken out nearby.
Shortly after, the Val-de-Bois fire chief was outside Richer’s cottage, confirming to local residents the presence of an active fire and reassuring them that local fire crews were responding.
The news came as a shock to Richer.
"I was like, wow, it actually is really close to us. But yet we couldn't see anything. Like there was no smoke," Richer told CBC on Monday. "We couldn't really hear anything.”
The only indication, aside from the presence of water bombers, was a large number of geese flying away from the site of the blaze.
While local fire crews were the first to respond, Val-des-Bois Mayor Roland Montpetit told CBC over email that Quebec's wildfire prevention and suppression agency, SOPFEU, joined in on the suppression efforts soon after.
Aside from multiple water bombers, the agency also contributed a four-person firefighting crew to help out on the forest floor, according to Mélanie Morin, SOPFEU’s fire information officer.
The fire had blazed through about 0.8 hectares by Tuesday morning and was under control, Morin said.
Locals should prepare for more fires to break out in the days ahead
Richer, whose main residence is in Ottawa and heads to the cottage with her family on weekends, says it's been noticeably hot and dry in the Val-des-Bois area.
Similar weather has been playing out across the Outaouais region this fall, something SOPFEU attributes to an unusually active fall wildfire season in Quebec this year.
Typically, Quebec would see about 40 wildfires in the fall, Morin said. But the province saw 103 wildfires in September alone, with an additional 84 so far in October as of Monday.
“There's been a decline [in fire activity] in the past few days because of a bit of precipitation that we received last Tuesday. However, this is a pattern that we've seen many times since mid-July," Morin said.
“It does bring down the fire occurrence a little bit, and then we go back into a warm and dry period where we do start to get a lot more fire starts.”
Quebec's wildfire suppression and prevention agency, SOPFEU, sent multiple water bombers to help suppress the fire near Val-des-Bois, Que. over the weekend. (CBC)
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On Tuesday morning, there were five wildfires burning in the Outaouais, half of the 10 total across the province.
The largest fire in the region in the Pontiac Regional Municipality has been burning since Oct. 5 and has grown to 21.8 hectares.
With warm and dry conditions expected to continue in the Outaouais, Morin says locals should prepare for more fires to break out in the days ahead.
The region's fire risk is considered extreme, meaning outdoor fires are not recommended.
Ontario's Ministry of Natural Resourcesis tracking three forest fires in areas it monitors west of Ottawa as of Tuesday morning. One between Petawawa and Pikwàkanagàn is not considered under control.
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This article, written by Liam Baker, was originally published for CBC News.