PARKSVILLE – Effective at 12:00 p.m. (noon) PDT on Friday, May 30, 2025, most open burning activities will be prohibited throughout the Coastal Fire Centre’s jurisdiction, with exceptions for Haida Gwaii. This prohibition is being enacted to help reduce human-caused wildfires and for public safety.
Category 2 and Category 3 open fires will be prohibited throughout the Coastal Fire Centre’s jurisdiction, with the exception that only Category 3 fires will be prohibited in the Haida Gwaii Forest District. This prohibition will be in place until October 31, 2025, or until the order is rescinded.
A map of the affected areas is available online and below.
This prohibition applies to all areas in the Fire Centre that are outside of municipal boundaries. In addition, this prohibition applies to the following types of land within municipal boundaries:
- Parks, conservancies and recreation areas (Park Act);
- Recreation sites, recreation trails, interpretive forest sites and trail-based recreation areas (Forest and Range Practices Act);
- Ecological reserves (Ecological Reserve Act);
- Wildlife management areas (Wildlife Act); and
- Private managed forest land (Private Managed Forest Land Act).
Municipalities often follow BC Wildfire Service prohibitions or may impose different prohibitions based on conditions in their local area. If you are in a municipality, be sure to check if local prohibitions are in place. If you are within a regional district or improvement district, this prohibition applies as well as any local prohibition issued by the local authority.
Specifically, this prohibition refers to the following activities.
“Category 2 open fire” which means an open fire, other than a category 1 campfire, that:
- Burns material in one pile not exceeding 2 m in height and 3 m in width,
- Burns material concurrently in 2 piles each not exceeding 2 m in height and 3 m in width, or
- Burns stubble or grass over an area that does not exceed 0.2 ha.
“Category 3 open fire” which means an open fire that burns:
- Material concurrently in 3 or more piles each not exceeding 2 m in height and 3 m in width,
- Material in one or more piles each exceeding 2 m in height or 3 m in width,
- One or more windrows, each not exceeding 200 m in length or 15 m in width,
- Stubble or grass over an area exceeding 0.2 ha.
Also prohibited are the activities listed below (Wildfire Act, Section 12):
- Fireworks; as defined in the Fireworks Act;
- Binary Exploding Targets;
- Burn Barrels or Burn Cages of any size or description;
- Controlled air incinerators
- Air curtain burners; and
- Carbonizers.
This prohibition does not apply to Category 1 (Campfires) that are a half-metre high by a half-metre wide or smaller, or to cooking stoves that use gas, propane or briquettes. Anyone lighting a campfire must maintain a fireguard by removing flammable debris from around the campfire area and have a hand tool or at least 8 litres of water available nearby to properly extinguish the fire.
Anyone found in contravention of an open fire prohibition may be issued a violation ticket for $1,150, required to pay an administrative penalty of up to $10,000 or, if convicted in court, fined up to $100,000 and/or sentenced to one year in jail. If the contravention causes or contributes to a wildfire, the person responsible may be ordered to pay all firefighting and associated costs.
The Coastal Fire Centre covers all the area west of the height of land on the Coast Mountain Range from the U.S.-Canada border at Manning Park, including Tweedsmuir South Provincial Park in the north, the Sunshine Coast, the Lower Mainland, Vancouver Island, the Gulf Islands and Haida Gwaii.
To report a wildfire, call 1-800-663-5555 toll-free or *5555 on a cell phone or report via the BC Wildfire Service App. For the latest information on current wildfire activity, burning restrictions and other related advisories, go to: http://www.bcwildfire.ca
Learn More:
Follow the latest wildfire news:
- on the free BC Wildfire Service public mobile app, available for Apple (iOS) and Android devices
- on Facebook: http://facebook.com/BCForestFireInfo
Contact:
Fire Information Officer
Coastal Fire Centre
250-951-4209
Connect with the Province of B.C. at www.gov.bc.ca/connect