Grass fire in Kamloops park blamed on after-school wienie roast

The cause of a fire that encroached on Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops last month was an after-school hotdog cookout.

The Peterson Creek park blaze on June 26 grew to three hectares in size, scorching the grassy hillside above a seniors housing complex, west of the hospital. Fire chief Ken Uzeloc is fairly certain investigators know what started it.

“There were some reports of two youth from the Peterson Creek fire, which occurred shortly after school was out,” he said at a council committee meeting last week. “That was very evident to be a cooking fire with remnants of a fire-in-a-can-style device with some hotdog sticks.”

Fire investigators are piecing together what sparked a series of fires in Kamloops beginning in late June, with just one so far pegged as a suspected arson.

Uzeloc said “interface fires,” which are wildfires that threaten a nearby community, are very difficult to investigate with certainty.

“We can get to the area, but the actual cause, if it’s not witnessed, is very difficult to do,” he said.

There was no evidence of a homeless encampment at the Peterson Creek fire, but it was one of a couple where a campfire for cooking was the most likely source. The source of another fire, one along the South Thompson River between Valleyview and Dallas, wasn’t as clear, but there was clear evidence of a homeless encampment in the area.

The only grass fire in the recent series of fires so far police and firefighters have said is suspected to be arson is the Strathcona Park fire near downtown in the West End neighbourhood.

On July 8, witnesses saw a person leaving the scene just as the fire began on the steep hillside above Overlanders Bridge.

Kamloops RCMP said officers would probe whether any of the other fires were related. No charges have been laid so far.