June/July 2004

The state of the Yukon wildfires snapshot 

Forest Fires burning in the Yukon fill the sky with a constant smoke haze.  The sun is a reddish blob and we are in an extreme fire hazard rating, which means no open fires.

Fire crew on standby at the firehall.  They run patrols in our area to wet down the burnables at the dump, check out the campgrounds, perform public awareness and basically be ready to go at a moment's notice.

 A crew member stationed at the dump to monitor fire activity... boring but important work

June 28/04: Jurgen removes fire boat from water after patrolling numerous lightning strikes along Marsh lake from the night before.

I snapped this from our plane just before we landed in Whitehorse.  Massive lightning storms with periodic rain are the result of the afternoon clouds.  The storms move slowly through our area, with many lightning strikes in our surrounding tinder-dry forest.