8/8/2017 Canadian fires still raging. No end in sight yet.

Fires in British Columbia are still active and showing very little sign of abating. As of today (Tuesday Aug. 8) there are 131 active fires in British Columbia. So far in 2017, 1,427,170 acres have burned in BC; their 10 year average acreage per year (2006-2016) is 382,875 acres so they are certainly experiencing a very extreme wildfire year and it's far from over. The six most significant and threatening of the BC fires are listed in the table below and the current perimeters of active fires in BC are shown on the map.

British Columbia Priority Wildfires

Name of Fire/Complex	Size (Ac.)
Elephant Hill (K20637)	284,171	About 115 miles north of US/Canada border above Ross Lake. About 85 miles W/NW of Kamloops; near Ashcroft. 30% contained.
West Quesnel Complex	197,684	About 275 miles north of the US/Canada border above Blaine, WA. 0% contained. 109 firefighters, 11 helicopters, 22 heavy equipment. Evacuation Order is in effect.
Central Cariboo Command	53,417	Fires from 0 to 40 % contained.
Hanceville Complex	64,741
Puntzi complex	25,451
Tautri Complex	258,719

A wildfire smoke dispersion model developed by the Canadians has been performing reasonably well to predict where the smoke from fires in Canada and the US will go. The modeled predictions for yesterday, today, and tomorrow at 5pm are shown below. Yesterday is shown for comparison so what you experienced in your location yesterday can be compared to the prediction for today and tomorrow. Many areas of Washington look pretty similar so no immediate change in the weather is expected to flush out the smoke. Remember this output is from a computer system that is trying to estimate fire size and growth plus meteorology so it will never be exactly correct. You can view the animations from the model at this link: https://weather.gc.ca/firework/firework_anim_e.html?type=em&utc=00