 people. British Columbians know that right now we are facing the worst wildfire season in our province's history. This unprecedented situation. Has come to a head this evening. In just the last 24 hours, the situation has evolved and deteriorated quite rapidly. In just the last hour, we've gone from about 4500 homes under evacuation to about 15,000 homes. Families being evacuated from their homes across the province. We have tens of thousands more across the province on evacuation alert. Tonight, as a result of this rapid deterioration, we are declaring a provincial state of emergency to ensure that we have rapid access to any tools that we may need to respond to this situation. These tools are necessary to support communities, to support families and support those brave frontline workers who are battling the fires in our forests and in our communities. There are some steps that British Columbians can take to assist our brave firefighters and our brave first responders. We need British Columbians to stay alert, to be prepared for evacuation warnings and evacuation alerts. If you get an evacuation order, please leave. I spent the day speaking with community leaders, First Nations leadership across the province in affected areas and one of their core messages is, please don't put firefighters at risk by staying in your home if you're under evacuation order. Please don't travel to affected areas. Only essential travel. We need roads clear for first responders, for emergency crews, for evacuees, and we need accommodation available as well. The situation is unpredictable right now and there are certainly difficult days ahead. If there's a silver lining here, it's that we know that under stressful times, under difficult circumstances, British Columbians rise to the occasion. British Columbians are generous, compassionate and resourceful and we support each other and we're going to keep doing that work. As a government, we're going to be here to support affected communities and families across the province. Those parents who are comforting, stressed out kids, those firefighters who are on the front lines, saving homes, saving communities, battling forest fires, those people wondering about what the future is going to look like in the next few days, the government will be ready for that. We can and we will get through this together. Thank you very much. I'd like to turn over to the Mr. Responsible Bowen Law. Thank you so much, Premier and good evening, everyone. I'm Bowen Ma, Minister of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness joining you today from the territories of the Musqueam, Swamish and Slavitooth peoples. Before I begin, I'd like to echo my condolences. I want to offer my condolences to people who have lost their homes due to the McDougal Creek wildfire near West Kelowna. I'd also like to offer my condolences to people across the province that are facing similar situation. The last 24 hours have been tremendously difficult for many people across British Columbia. And over the last 24 hours and since I last spoke to you this afternoon, the wildfire rapidly evolved. Approximately 15,000 people are under evacuation order across the province. Approximately 20,000 additional people are under an evacuation alert. The cold front we are experiencing throughout the province has resulted in a rapidly deteriorating situation. There are numerous fires across the province threatening communities. People have been mostly following our call not to travel to certain places and to stay out of the way of emergency crews so that they can do their jobs. However, we are also seeing more and more people being evacuated and access to accommodations is increasingly challenging in the interior. We need accommodations available to keep people safe and to house critical response personnel like firefighters and health care staff. At this time, we are strongly recommending that people with plans to travel to fire affected areas throughout the central interior and southeast in the coming days to cancel those plans. We need tourists and travelers to take this situation as seriously as the residents of these areas do. We ask that you please leave accommodation space available to evacuees, emergency personnel and health care workers working across the province. I repeat, do not travel to wildfire affected areas for non-essential reasons. By limiting our travel in affected areas we can make room for those who need it and also ensure that our roads are clear for those who need to evacuate quickly. As Premier Eby mentioned the first priority of our government is to ensure public safety. We will continue to do everything that we need to safeguard people and protect properties and communities from the threat of wildfire by declaring a state of provincial emergency we are able to enact extraordinary powers that, among other tools could include legally enforceable orders that restrict travel to specific areas if people do not adhere to our calls to avoid non-essential travel to the central interior and southeast. We all have a part to play to protect ourselves our families our neighbours and our communities. This decision to declare a provincial state of emergency was not done lightly. It was made on the advice of emergency management officials and BC wildfire service experts. I am continuing to encourage everyone to please follow the advice of your local government and First Nation. If you are put under an evacuation order you must leave the area immediately. Evacuation alerts and orders are published on the emergency emergency info bc website at emergencyinfo bc.gov bc.ca Please stay calm be alert and be prepared. Thank you. I believe we have some time for a few questions. Thank you for joining us. We are going to start with Richard Sisman who will be receiving one question and one follow-up. Go ahead Richard. Why not use those powers in the state of emergency now and ban people from coming here to Kelowna in order to ensure you have those rooms and how worried should people in this community be but also in other communities in British Columbia as we see these conditions deteriorate. The situation has deteriorated quite rapidly and we are relying on the advice of the front-line officials that are on the ground right now in terms of the tools they need to get the job done. If they advise us that they need an order for essential transportation only in these regions then Mr. Ma and her team and our government will not hesitate to issue those necessary orders they want us to be prepared they want us to have those tools ready for if we need them because this is a rapidly changing situation. Richard, I know you asked just one question but I forgot the second half of your first question. Should people be right now not just here in Kelowna but in other parts of British Columbia and that can be my follow-up? I think what we are asking all British Columbians to do is to stay calm to stay alert with media to check in online about evacuation orders that may affect their area to be fire smart as we have been asking people to do all summer this is a historic wildfire season for British Columbia and we need people to do their part to make sure that our province comes through this as best as possible if you have the ability to support somebody with storing an RV with storing livestock in agricultural communities if you are able to take in a friend or a neighbour that is under evacuation order to ease pressure on accommodation please reach out and provide those offers to neighbours this is the resourcefulness, the resilience and the compassion British Columbians is going to get us through this and I will turn it over to Minister Maw for anything she might add to request British Columbians. Thank you so much premier I think you covered it so we need people to stay calm we need people to be alert and to be prepared those living in wildfire affected areas or in areas at risk of wildfire need to have their emergency plans in place they need to reach out to friends and family in other areas of the province to start discussing those potential building options they need to have their grab and go kit ready to go and they need to pay attention to the alerts and orders issued by their local government their regional district or their first nation pay attention to those alerts it will save lives and by following them you are also helping out our first responders on the ground our next question what else will the state of emergency allow the government to do from a high level the state of emergency declaration does a couple of things it communicates to people across the province the seriousness of the deteriorating situation that we are facing when we ask people to restrict their travel when we ask them to change and cancel their travel plans to fire affected areas it really underlines that there is a state of emergency it enables a number of legal tools for us to issue specific orders and to ensure that resources are available it might be accommodation we had to reach out to lower mainland fire services to ask them to contribute additional resources to Kelowna to be able to respond it could be heavy equipment and it could be other resources that are required for the front lines Minister Ma I don't know if you have anything else to add in terms of what this would enable Thank you so much let me be clear we've been clear from the beginning that the ability to provide resources for the fire on the front lines is enabled already through the wildfire act we do have those tools available however a provincial state of emergency allows us to compel resources from unwilling partners or uncooperative partners I will say right now we are having enormous levels of cooperation across the board from all corners of the province which is largely why we haven't required a provincial state of emergency before but given the rapidly evolving situation that we now find ourselves in we can foresee some of those extraordinary orders that may facilitate may be helpful to us in our response and we want to be ready to be able to use them at a moment's notice Thank you Obviously this is a very unpredictable situation but what concerns do you have going into the weekend? Here I think what we're concerned about is that what we're seeing so far is rapidly escalating very unpredictable and we know that from the forecast the cold front will continue to cause unpredictable weather patterns that will make fighting fires very very challenging we have seen in the last 24 hours evacuation alerts quickly fall to become evacuation orders falling like dominoes in some areas and that speed at which we are going from a threat to a potential threat to an imminent threat is incredibly concerning we do need the tools available to us to secure accommodations if required we are seeing that there are wildfire wildland firefighting camps so I'll say again we're in a situation where we have wildland firefighter camps being evacuated wildfire firefighters are actually being evacuated from their accommodations as well as they are actively fighting wildfires this is part of the reason why we're experiencing the acute need for accommodations in these areas and perhaps I'll check in with Cliff Chapman to see if he has anything to add Minister as stated my name is Cliff Chapman I'm the director of provincial operations for BC wildfire service I'll touch on a couple pieces here that have gone over in the last few minutes the first one is around the worry around fire behavior in the coming days I think Minister Ma covered it perfectly it isn't about worrying it's about being prepared have your family ready know that in the southern half of the province right now but also as we start to see some of the fires in the north still not have any rain we do need people to be ready we need people to be calm and that should allow us the access we need on the roadways and not have to enact some of the measures that this announcement gives us but we are willing to if we need to as Minister Ma stated it has been excellent cooperation up until this point from the majority of the province as we've experienced fires over the last number of months and in particular in the last 24 hours as we saw the uptake in evacuation orders and alerts in very high pressure situations people are listening and they are following the instructions of their local governments and we appreciate that greatly for next question we're going to go back to the phone lines for Brianna Charlebois from Canadian Press Brianna please unmute and go ahead Hi there thanks so much I'm just trying to get a little bit of clarity on the numbers was it 15,000 homes, families or people who were under evacuation over at this point Brendan I'm going to go over to you just so that you can make sure that we have that to exactly right Good afternoon My name is Brendan Rals I'm the Director of Provincial Response Operations for the Ministry of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness or EMCR and so the numbers as presented I just want to remind everybody that it's an extremely dynamic situation that we're facing often times having exact information from the field can be difficult and take time to build the latest numbers that we had was that we have approximately 15,000 people on evacuation order and 20,000 people on evacuation alert across the entire province Brianna do you have a follow up question Yeah I guess what is the immediate aftermath like what are you hoping to get would that be help from other provinces and more international help what is sort of the hope in the immediate future So we have been extremely grateful for the out of province support that we've already received and continue to receive only from the federal government and other provinces in the country but international wildland firefighting resources that have joined us here in this province against our fight against a very challenging wildfire season we continue to assess our resource needs from that place and I'll make sure that Mr. Ralsen has a chance to speak to some of those assessments if you have anything to add there but in the immediate future what we want from this particular announcement today is first to communicate that we are at a high state level of readiness with a provincial state of emergency that it is possible that additional legally enforceable orders that are related to travel restrictions may come into place and we need people to make the choice now to stay at home and avoid those areas in the central interior in the southeast did you have anything else to add? Thank you very much the BC Wildfire Service the CEO Yen Meyer has told me that the ongoing assessment is continuous and there an effort right now to gather the resources that will be necessary to fight the fires throughout the province but particularly in the central Okanagan that assessment process is a very dynamic one and will be updated very quickly if additional resources are needed then they will be asked for a requisitioned and deployed I don't know Cliff Chapman may have further details on where the status of those requests is at the present time what I can confirm is that we have a request in through the Canadian interagency forest fire center we have had one of those requests answered so we are looking to secure 16 highly trained highly certified individual resources so 16 coming from Australia likely to show up next week we also have a request in for an additional 200 other fighting resources couple points of clarity we did not need this declaration to have full access to international and national resources as we have seen for the last three months during this very challenging fire season we have had the ability to request these resources and we have been requesting these resources day over day and week over week and obviously at this point in time and I mentioned on the briefing yesterday between BC and Northwest Territories agencies in Canada that are at the highest preparedness level given our response needs and so really the resources are generally being divided between Northwest Territories and BC to support both of our fire efforts over the coming weeks so that will bring to the end this press conference I just wanted to wrap up by saying thank you so much to the firefighters who have left their families behind who are on the front lines of the fire we know you are tired we know you have been working incredibly hard we know you are putting yourself at risk to do this critically important work for British Columbians we are so grateful for all that you do for us and all that we are going to ask you to do over the next few days on behalf of all British Columbians I want to say how much it means to us that you are out there and you have our full support thank you