Facing the Flames: New and Old Ways of Co-Existing with Fire

The emergence of catastrophic mega-fires over the past five years demands transformative action in BC. Unprecedented fires are burning huge tracts of culturally and ecologically important territory, threatening lives and livelihoods, blanketing the province in smoke, exacerbating systemic inequities, and releasing staggering amounts of emissions into the atmosphere. It’s a frequency, scale, and severity we’ve never seen before, fuelled by growing climate impacts, altered forest landscapes, and the forced removal of Indigenous Stewardship and good fire from these lands. Catastrophic mega-fires that we’re unable to suppress and control are our emerging reality-- but they don’t have to be.
As part of the annual Bruce and Lis Welch Community Dialogue programming, we explored big ideas for the future of wildfire in our province, through dialogue, with speakers Joe Gilchrist, of Interior Salish Firekeepers Society, and Paul Hessburg, Senior Research Ecologist with US Forest Services.