PRINCE GEORGE
High today: 25 Low tonight: 10 Details page 22
Citizen
Serving the Central Interior since 1916
TUESDAY, AUGUST 4,1998
80 CENTS (HOME DELIVERED: 50 CENTS A DAY)
TODAY
COMMUNITY
PAGE 13
How does your garden grow?
t SPORTS
■ Seattle’s Slade Group won two of three games over Prince George’s Lheidi River Kings to win the A side of the Peace Arch Invitational men’s fastball tournament during the holiday weekend. /12
OBITUARY
f
Mi A
■ Shari Lewis, who enchanted baby boomers and their children with a spirited, squeaky-voiced sock puppet named Lamb Chop, hasdiedofcancerat65. /19
CANADA
" ■ Fifty Americans and six British soldiers were injured when a massive ammunition dump caught fire and exploded in Kuwait following the Gulf War. The toll would have been higher had it not been for the bravery and quick thinking of the men and women of Canada’s 1 Combat Engineer Regiment. /6
WORLD
* . ' - t ■■ ■■■ . ■ V • ■: ' .
■ The mystery of two babies switched at birth has taken a twist with the discovery that the couple raising one of the girls died a month ago in a car crash, never knowing of the mix-up. /14
Cornered
by Baldwin
14 01996 MM Bekftwn / Oi« by UmverMi Press SynOcato www uexpress a
Pool Boy goes domestic.
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II
INDEX
Ann Landers..................17
Around Town..................16
Bridge......................21
City, B.C................3,5,13
Classified ...............20-23
Comics ......................18
Crossword ...................18
Entertainment................19
Horoscope ..................21
Lotteries....................15
Lifestyles................16,17
Movies.......................19
Nation .....................6,7
Sports ....................8-12
Television...................19
World.....................14,15
1
Forest fire crews scrambling
Forest fires in the Central Interior became so numerous by Monday afternoon that crews from Smithers, Telkwa, the Coast and even Quebec, plus helicopters from across B.C. and Alberta, were moved to Prince George.
There were 19 fires Friday in the Prince George region — the northeast quarter of the province — mainly in the Prince George District, said fire control officer Chris Duffy.
Saturday morning Duffy said he expected another 15 fires that day. By mid-afternoon Monday there had been 12 more starts. Altogether, more than 110 fires had started in the Prince George forest region in the past week, he said Sunday.
Most were small “spot” fires able to be handled by a three-person initial attack crew, he said Saturday. However, a fire on Bobtail Mountain, about 50 kilometres southwest of Prince George, grew to cover four hectares. An airplane was used to “bomb” the fire with retardant which also acts as
Forest Fire Danger
Moderate
Prince George Forest District
fertilizer after the fire. An air tanker — as the forest service calls the modified airplanes — was also used at a fire on the north side of Williston Lake which reached four and one-half hectares.
Most of the fires were caused by lightning, Duffy said Monday. Four bigger fires, all started by lightning, were burning Monday.
■ The Dore Creek fire west-southwest of McBride deepened the red sunset and sent a column of dark brown smoke over the Robson Valley Sunday night. By Monday afternoon it had con-
sumed 20 hectares, and the forest service sent a 20-person crew from Pemberton and three supers visory personnel in to fight the blaze.
■ TVvo fires in the Herrick range — one consuming 125 hectares and the other about 20 hectares — engaged two crews. One was the 20-member Prince George Firehawks Unit Crew under Everette Rose and Lloyd Vandermark. The other was made up of 39 firefighters from Quebec and additional members of the Firehawks.
■ A 100-hectare fire by Mt. Garbitt near Pine Pass was increasingly under control Monday and had not advanced in two days, Duffy said. Lightning started it last Wednesday.
■ A 1,000-hectare fire 30 kilometres northwest of Fort Ware sent clouds of smoke into that community Monday. It was not burning prime timber and the forest service was giving its suppression a lower priority, seeking only to contain it.
More on B.C. forest fires, page 5
ROCK FEST — Bill Henderson of the rock group Chilliwack was one of many performers delighting thousands of fans at the Vanderhoof Rock Fest during the long weekend. The event was held under sunny skies
at a 1,000-acre farm. Promoters are already working on next year’s festival. See review, page 3 and another photo, page 2.
Citizen photo by Brent Braaten
Bodies recovered from aircraft that crashed into lake Dec. 16
by PAUL STRICKLAND Citizen staff
Mackenzie RCMP and other personnel have recovered two bodies from the site of last December’s airplane crash into Williston Lake.
The deceased were identified as Roderick Grove, 34, of Vanderhoof and Florijan Gregoric, 54, of Prince George — passengers on the aircraft.
The light plane carrying pilot Mike Bottcher, 32, Grove and Gregoric was travelling south to Mackenzie Dec. 16 when it went missing. The crash site in Williston Lake was later identified by search-and-rescue personnel.
Police were initially able to confirm the aircraft was in about 160
feet of water.
On July 25 and 26, officers from the Mackenzie RCMP detachment returned to the crash site to continue their search for the wreckage, the pilot and the passengers. With the help of Can-Dive Construction of North Vancouver, they found evidence of the missing persons.
The Transport Safety Board, the Coroner’s Service and the RCMP developed a full-scale recovery plan, said Sgt. Colin Farquhar.
A large ferry from Finley Nav of Mackenzie was used as a platform for a 75-ton crane. A full dive team from Can-Dive arrived Thursday and began the recovery on Friday.
The local B.C. Conservation office helped by ferrying personnel in their jet boat, and also assisted in evaluating any potential environmental hazards caused by leaking fuel or oils.
Unfortunately, after two days of searching the pilot could not be located, Farquhar said. No further searches are planned.
The federal Transport Safety Board continues to examine the destroyed aircraft. It’s not known when their final report will be available.
“The Mackenzie RCMP detachment would like to thank everyone involved in this co-ordinated search and recovery effort,” Farquhar said.
The last gasp for hot spell?
Environment Canada spent part of the weekend revising their forecasts to allow for higher temperatures in Prince George.
On Saturday morning the forecast for the day was revised from a high of 27 to a high of 29.
The prediction for Sunday and Monday was also revised upward from a high of 25 or 26 to 30 degrees on both days.
Today is the first day the temperature might drop, said meteorologist Bob Shaw.
Monday the actual high temperature Monday fell short of the forecast high by 0.6 degrees.
The official high recorded at the airport at 5 p.m. was 29.4 degrees,
but relative humidity was a desertlike 26%.
Afterwards barometric pressure slipped to 101.8 kilopascals and continued declining, a sign of weather changing to an unsettled state and possibly rain.
Forecasters expected the temperature to rise to 25 or 26 late this morning or early this afternoon before a low-pressure area in the upper atmosphere arrives later in the afternoon with associated cooler, more moist weather.
Chances of showers or thunderstorms should be 70%. Precipitation amounts may not be significant, except in neighborhoods or fields directly under a thunderstorm.
Winds may pick up.
Wednesday should be cooler and cloudier, with highs of only 21 or 22. Chances of showers may be as much as 60%. Winds may be quite blustery at times.
Normal temperatures for this time of year are 8 for a low and 22 for a high.
For firefighters working for the B.C. Forests Ministry, the new trend in weather will be a mixed blessing.
Some rain and generally higher humidity levels will mean forest vegetation dries out less quickly. But continued thunderstorms provide more chances for lightning to start fires and higher winds can spread fires more quickly.
qNEil DIDN’T GETAWAY
Gary Schuett, a welder at the Northwood pulp mill in Prince George, caught a 7’5” halibut estimated at 391 pounds July 3Q.
“When I caught a 109-pounder the day before I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.
“This is beyond my wildest dreams,” Schuett said.
He caught the big fish using a home-made jig with a piece of herring on it, fishing in one of the side channels of the Inside Passage about two and a half hours from Kitimat, he said.
“It took Godfrey Medhurst and I two hours and 10 minutes to get it to the boat,” Schuett said.
“One person couldn’t do it alone. It was a hot, still afternoon, so we were exhausted by the time we got it into the boat.”
Schuett said they didn’t realize how big the fish was until they stopped to anchor for the night.
“We got it into a dory, and pulled it onto some rocks to dress it out. When we saw how big it was, we measured it.”
The fish won’t go in the record books because a B.C. Halibut Commission table was used to calculate the weight from the size of the fish, rather than using scales, he said.
Schuett has been fishing out of Kitimat for 10 years, operating a boat charter during the summers on his holidays from Northwood.
“The bottom fishing now is as good as it gets,” he said.
More than 2,000 enjoy Knights Day in park
by PAUL STRICKLAND Citizen staff
About 2,000 people visited Fort George Park Monday to celebrate B.C. Day and enjoy the second annual Knights Day in the Park.
Six hours of free family entertainment organized by the Prince George Knights Society began at 11 a.m. included a jumping castle, hoppers, face-painting and other kids’ games.
Clowns from the Shriners organization visited the park to the delight of children.
Adults enjoyed themselves, too. A few threw frisbees to each other. Many had set out blankets or set up lawn chairs to hear the entertainment from the bandshell.
Seven bands and other artists were on the program. Rutabaga Chilluns, the Rae King Blues Band and Alice Lyon were among the performers heard mid-afternoon.
Attendance for Knights Day was about the same as last year, said Lee-Ann Mitchell, administrator of the Columbus Community Centre, one of the organizers. “It’s not a bad turnout,” she said toward late afternoon. “Everyone seems to be having a good time, and that’s the most important thing.
“Not many things are free any more, and Knights Day is a chance for the whole family to enjoy an afternoon of free entertainment,” she said. “It’s one of the ways the Knights of Columbus
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give back to the community.” The Knights of Columbus donated more than $200,000 to organizations and charities in the Prince George area last year, Mitchell said.
Many other organizations donated prizes for Knights Day, she said.
The Nechako Rotary Club had a booth for selling raffle tickets for a stylish red convertible. Proceeds will go to purchase furnishings for the AWAC (Association Advocating for Women and Children) shelter on Quebec Street.
Ed Clapp of Prince George was the winner of the draw held at 5 p.m. for a 1998 GMC Sierra SLE three-quarter-ton 4x4 extended cab truck and a 26-foot Vanguard Wrangler fifth wheel.
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