VERNON, British Columbia (AP) — A fast-moving wildfire destroyed about 230 homes in an Indigenous community in western Canada, officials said Tuesday, making it one of the country’s most destructive fires in recent years. Dan Wilson, chief of the Okanagan Indian Band, said the Bradley Creek wildfire devastated much of the reserve near Vernon, about 440 kilometers (275 miles) northeast of Vancouver.“It was hard to recognize my community from the air with all the structures and the forest gone,” Wilson said after surveying the area by helicopter.The destruction ranks among Canada’s worst recent wildfires. A 2024 blaze in Jasper, Alberta, destroyed about 350 homes, while the 2023 McDougall Creek wildfire, also in British Columbia’s Okanagan region, destroyed about 200 homes.Canada has endured increasingly destructive wildfire seasons in recent years, with smoke from the blazes repeatedly spreading across North America and triggering widespread air-quality alerts.
Wilson called the devastation “surreal” and said it was one of the darkest days in the band’s history. The fire erupted late Friday and was driven by wind gusts of up to 115 kilometers (71 miles) per hour.“The fire spread so fast that some of our members only had five minutes to evacuate,” he said.
