Cough, cough.
Sputter.
Tri-City residents can be forgiven if they think they’ve landed on the planet Tatooine of Star Wars fame rather than beautiful B.C.
Who hasn’t been startled by the smokey skies rendering local landmarks a hazy blur, while campers seek out pristine lakes, mountains and our iconic rain forests through a beige fog.
This isn’t the first year that air quality warnings, forest fire evacuations and a provincial emergency declaration have marred the summer, and with temperatures and drought the new normal, it won’t be the last.
It seems our province is burning up, along with our tourist dollars, homes and valuable forests.
Fortunately, we haven’t heard too many warnings about water levels in local reservoirs, including the Coquitlam reservoir, and it appears Metro Vancouver’s early water restrictions have helped.
According to the latest reservoir post, storage levels are 70% of maximum and though low, roughly in the normal range.
It wasn’t that long ago when people could water their lawns to their heart’s content, knowing there would be enough rain to refill the reservoir. And campfires — once the most important element of a family campout — have long since been doused. Those marshmallows and weenie roasts now have to be held in May or October to avoid the campfire ban.
Still, there is hope that despite the changes in our temperature and summer rainfall there are a few constants. We know there will be rain during the PNE — there always is — and this week it was reported that a sockeye salmon returned to to the Coquitlam River, after a more than 100 year hiatus, thanks to 13 years of restoration efforts.
This is some good news among the bleak stories of forest fires tearing apart B.C. communities.
Let’s hope B.C. can be restored and the fire risk abated through efforts at reducing greenhouse gasses from lower emission and zero emission cars, waste reduction, better homebuilding and other initiatives.
Those beige-coloured skies of Tatooine should stay in the movies. We’re looking forward to a clean and green September.
