Grande Prairie County wildfire evacuation order expanded as B.C. wildfire cross into Alberta

A wildfire burning near Grande Prairie.

An evacuation order in northern Alberta was expanded on Friday due to a B.C. wildfire that crossed the provincial boundary.

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The County of Grande Prairie ordered residents north of Township Road 700 to 740, east of the border to Range Road 130, to leave due to the fire.

An Alberta Wildfire spokesperson said the blaze, named the Kiskatinaw River Wildfire, grew 30 square kilometres over 24 hours.

As of Saturday at noon, the agency estimated it was a total of 143 square kilometres and moving fast.

“We’re expecting that aggressive behaviour is going to remain in place today because the winds were going to be stronger this morning,” public information officer Derrick Forsythe told CTV News Edmonton.

The Alberta government and Grande Prairie County are both working with B.C. on establishing containment lines and structure protection.

Although the wind was expected to calm Saturday afternoon, Forsythe said Alberta Wildfire’s meteorologists also saw a chance it would shift directions and possibly begin to push the fire more south.

An alert is still in effect for the following area of Grande Prairie County:

• east along Township Road 710, from Range Road 130 to 124 and north along British Columbia/Alberta border to Township Road 750 until Highway 43.

Residents ordered to leave were asked to report to the reception centre at the Hythe Community Library at 10013 100 St.

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Provincial outlook

Elsewhere in Alberta, a few days of “good rain” have enabled crews to gain control of other wildfires.

As of Saturday at noon, nearly half of Alberta’s 60 wildfires were classified as “being held,” which means they’re not expected to grow.

“We still have some active areas of fire: High Level’s still pretty dry; Peace River is still pretty dry,” Forsythe said. “But we’re starting to make some pretty good progress for other areas.”