A nearly week-long state of emergency for parts of central Newfoundland will be lifted at midnight, the provincial government announced Friday night. Grand Falls-Windsor, Bishop’s Falls and Botwood, as well as the Coast of Bays region, were all under evacuation alert as two separate blazes broke out on the city’s doorstep. But favorable weather allowed fire crews to turn around. Special air quality advisories were also lifted earlier Friday in areas affected by wildfires in central Newfoundland, as Premier Andrew Furey says the province is entering the next stage of fighting the blazes. In a video posted Thursday on Furey’s social media pages, the premier said better air quality levels than initially expected helped firefighters tackle the fires in both the Paradise Lake area and the Bay d’Espoir highway . “Because of the hard working women and men on the ground and in the air, we feel like the fire is just around the corner. That means the evacuation risk for Grand Falls-Windsor and Bishop’s Falls is pretty low right now,” Fuey said. . “The threat level has gone down, but it’s still there.” ‼️ Update on forest fires for Thursday, August 11 with Min. Bragg. Read more: pic.twitter.com/3Ejx7YBIhM — @FureyAndrew Wildfire Officer Jeff Motty said Friday that both large fires are still considered out of control but are not currently growing. The Paradise Lake fire is 17,233 hectares, while the Bay d’Espoir Highway covers 5,614 hectares, The size of another notable fire, in South Lake – north of Grand Falls-Windsor near the community of Point Leamington – also remains stable at 283 hectares. The perimeter of the fire is 20 percent contained, Motty said. “From last night’s notes, we never saw any increase in size in our fires… So the actual perimeter or footprint of the fire remains pretty much constant,” Motty said. “[Firefighters] they’ve made great progress … They’re starting to get hoses out and they’re really starting to move around this fire and do some work on the perimeter of the fire.” Water bombers like these will continue to be used to fight fires over the weekend. (Henrike Wilhelm/CBC) The Bay d’Espoir Freeway will remain open Friday, the third consecutive day the freeway has been open after being closed earlier this week. The decision will be reviewed on Saturday. Motti said crews would continue to fight the blaze on foot over the weekend, in addition to using helicopters and water bombers. He said firefighters are also beginning to move away from the initial attack phase to work on hot spots and preventative measures such as fire breaks. “It really seems like we’re making that transition from the initial attack to more solid action,” Motty said. “We’re kind of at the point where we’ve prevented any further fire growth, and now we’re just working to contain them. It’s a continuous action or sweep, so there’s a lot of work to be done by us.” Weather conditions will be sunny and warm with light winds in the Grand Falls-Windsor area as crews continue to battle the flames. A high temperature of around 22 degrees Celsius is expected with a humidity of 27 and light winds of around 10 to 20 km/h from northerly directions. Canadian meteorologist Mike Vandenberg said residents of the community could smell smoke in the air early this morning, but that will likely clear by the afternoon. He’s also watching for the next weather system heading into the area, which could bring 5 to 10 millimeters of rain Saturday night into Sunday morning. In the video, Forestry Minister Derrick Bragg encouraged residents to remain prepared in case the fire situation changes, as any small factor could change the threat level for the area. “Our fire is still listed as out of control. When we saw out of control four or five days ago, there were flames in the sky,” Bragg said. The Department of Children, Seniors and Community Development announced Friday that the emergency shelter in Deer Lake will close as officials determined it is no longer needed. People staying at the shelter will be sent to either Bishop’s Falls, Grand Falls-Windsor or Botwood, but the shelter will reopen if needed, the department said. Read more from CBC Newfoundland and Labrador
