The wildfire season in Alberta for 2018 officially ended yesterday (October 31) and now officials from Alberta Wildfire are giving us a peek into exactly how things went this year.  

According to Wildfire Information Officer Travis Fairweather, it was a calmer season this year in the province.  "We saw just under 1,300 wildfires, which is a little bit below our five year average of just over 1,400 wildfires.  We saw about 60,000 hectares burned, whereas our five-year average is over 235,000 hectares.  Certainly, it was a little bit quieter of a season than we've in the last few years, 2015 and 2016 especially."

The decline in the number and the area burned in the wildfires can be attributed to many things, but Fairweather points to one in particular.

"Certainly we saw our human-caused wildfires were slightly down compared to our five-year average.  We saw about 57 percent of the fires this year were human-caused whereas our five-year average is about 64 percent.  It's always good when we see less human-caused wildfires.  Certainly, we consider all human-caused wildfires to be 100 percent preventable.  The other source of wildfires is lightning-caused so that was about on par for our average.  Anytime we can keep those human-caused wildfires down, that's good for us."

While Alberta's wildfire season was relatively calm, the same couldn't be said of wildfires in other parts of North America.  The province was able to send crews, aircraft, and equipment to help in other fire hotspots, according to Fairweather.

"We were able to send out crews to Ontario, B.C,, Quebec, up into the Territories as well as down into Idaho, Montana, and Washington.  A total of 681 firefighters were exported out of the province.  Anytime we're able to do that, it's great for us.  In the past, we've had to call on a bit of help, during the Fort McMurray wildfires of 2016, we brought in firefighters from across Canada and around the world, so anytime we're able to return the favour, we're happy to do so."

The wildfire season in Alberta runs from March 1st to October 31st.  Now that it's over for 2018, Alberta Wildfire begins it's planning for the 2019 fire season.

"That's when we see a lot of our prevention, planning go into place.  Some of our FireSmart work we get done throughout the province.  Anything we can do to get prepared for the next season, that's what we're working on."  

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