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PRINCE GEORGE

MONDAY, AUGUST 11, 2003

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Putting the pieces back together
Local SPCA helping re-unite animals with forest fire victims
by MARK NIELSEN Citizen staff From cattle and horses to dogs and kittens, there have been plenty of animals to look after as a result of the wildfires north of Kamloops -- and Prince George SPCA manager J e a n n i n e Wo o d h o u s e h a s b e e n among those attending to the furry friends. Woodhouse has been in Kamloops since Friday evening, helping out both at the shelter and tending to livestock left behind after their owners were given evacuation notices. While she's caught glimpses of the destruction, what may stand out most in her mind is the way people have come together to help out. "People have been phenomenal here," she said. "I'm so impressed by the community." Officials from the SPCA and Noah's Wish, a U.S.-based group specializing in disaster relief for animals, were given authority to venture into the fire zones making sure the livestock were being fed and watered. "We would go out in teams of two and go to the various places," Woodhouse said from Kamloops on Sunday. "And we spent some time rechecking Pinantan Lake and Paul Lake areas (just north of Kamloops) to make sure that all the animals had been cared for and that the owners had returned successfully to those areas as well." The Kamloops SPCA shelter was converted into a rescue centre, from where pets were transferred to any of about 1,000 foster homes around the city. Another 250 horses, goats and sheep were taken to the city's exhibition grounds and cattle went to the stockyard. "The shelter has been running 24 hour s a day, and t he exhibition grounds have been running 24 hours a day," she said. "These people who are there, they catch four or five hours sleep and they're back out again, delivering supplies and getting whatever is needed. "And the Kamloops businesses and the community, they supply all the food, not only for the animals but for the volunteers." The pressure is starting to ease now, she said, because the evacuation orders have been lifted, but the work is far from over. Only about 200 of the 1,200 animals or so rescued from the hot zones have been claimed. "We don't have to be open all night any longer," Woodhouse said. "The smoke clearing up the valley has helped a lot. You still see a few choppers and bombers going over, but they're much further north and I

CP photo

A charred truck sits in front of what used to be a home in Louis Creek after a forest fire swept through the area. Residents were allowed to return to their homes on Saturday.
think in areas that are a little bit more contained and much less populated." Meanwhile, the several Nordic-breed dogs scheduled to come up to the Prince George shelter remained in Kelowna and will soon be back in Kamloops where they can be claimed by their owners.

Evacuees leave again after finding poor conditions
by CAROL HARRINGTON Canadian Press KAMLOOPS -- Some of the thousands of forest fire evacuees who returned home over the weekend have pulled out again because of smoke-filled air, the stench of rotting food and intermittent electricity. "I'm quite surprised they are telling people to come back," said Sharon Lane, who returned after 10 days away from her home in Barriere. "If you had health issues, you wouldn't want to be here." Like many other evacuees, Lane and her husband Mark arrived to discover their house reeked of spoiled fish, meat and dairy products because the refrigerator was, and sometimes still is, without power. "It is nasty," said Lane, who returned Sunday but stayed only a few hours to clean and air out her house, then left again to stay with friends in a nearby community that wasn't so hit so hard by wildfires. An evacuation order was lifted on Friday and Saturday for 6,500 residents of several communities 40 to 70 kilometres northeast of Kamloops. Officials warned at the time that people with health problems might postpone heading back because the area was still shrouded in thick smoke from smoldering wildfires. Those who did return found sporadic electrical and telephone service. There was no fuel or food to stock empty refrigerators because gas stations and retail stores were closed. There is also a water boil order in effect for the town of Barriere, 50 kilometres north of Kamloops, because there was no electricity to pump chlorine into the water system. Officials tried to forewarn returning residents about the conditions they would face -- advising them to load up on gas, batteries, flashlights bottled water and food for two days -- but not everyone got the message. The fire, which has consumed almost 200 square kilometres, started in the town of McLure, about 40 kilometres north of Kamloops, and swept through Louis Creek, toward Barriere. The blaze is 50 per cent contained but is still raging out of control in a sparsely populated area north of Barriere, where a few dozen people remain under an evacuation order. So far, damage estimates to properties in the Kamloops-area fires come to $8.2 million, which includes the destruction of 39 houses, 26 trailer homes, 99 sheds and barns, as well as house contents. It doesn't include the Louis Creek sawmill, other businesses and hundreds of gutted vehicles. Meanwhile, crews have been working around the clock for the past few days, clearing roads of fallen rock and replacing burned telephone poles and electrical wires. Provincial crews will soon begin scouring charred forests to remove dead livestock and wildlife because the rotting carcasses are a threat to the groundwater. Highway 5 north of Kamloops remains closed to regular traffic but is open for residents north of Heffley Creek to Barriere. Provincial officials say the road is closed to other drivers at the request of residents who don't want "fire tourists" gawking around their communities.

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Fans say the Zipper is ride of rides
Citizen staff The Zipper rules the midway. That was the consensus of at least seven young people who sampled the rides at the Prince George Exhibition on Sunday. In fact, just as soon as Christine McKnight, 14, Jessica George, 12, Sheri McKnight, 12, and Ashley Brown Miller, 13, had finished a turn on the Zipper they were back in the line for another go. By then, most had been on the ride at least four times. "It's fun! You go upside down and tilt around and everything," said George, who had a little trouble finding her land legs just after getting off the ride, located at the far end of the midway. Stephen Yungen, 12, and Logan Jewell, 13, who had just finished a turn on the Scrambler, also felt the Zipper was superior. Karson Jewell, 10, had yet to follow in his buddies footsteps and take a ride on the Zipper, and for the moment at least, the Scrambler was tops in his mind. As for the rest of the rides, neither group was that impressed. There were only six bona fide thrill rides on the midway, and there have been more in the past, they said. If there has been an improvement, Logan Jewell said it's been that fewer of the rides have broken down this year. However, the Tarantula was not operating due to mechanical problems. Brown Miller said she misses the Graviton, the Cyclone and the Circle of Fire, all rides based on the merry-goround, except, of course, they're much faster.  The exact figures won't be known until mid-week, but attendance at this year's Prince George Exhibition may have dropped off compared to previous years, said PGX general manager Sandi Switzer on Sunday. "I think we're down a bit, but nothing drastic," she said. Switzer pointed to the general decline in the city's population combined with the heavy rain showers Saturday afternoon and the cold climate Sunday morning as factors. "Once the weather warmed up, they turned out," she said. Switzer said the llama and the alpaca demonstrations drew some good crowds, and she heard comments about how there was more agriculture this year, "which is good because we're an agricultural show." The PGX will continue for another year, she said. "There will be a 92nd."

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Citizen photo by Brent Braaten

The famed Zipper was going non-stop over the weekend at the PGX.

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