 And thank you for joining us for an operational briefing on a wildfire near Lytton here in British Columbia. A reminder to media on the line, please press star one to enter the queue for the opportunity to ask a question and a follow-up. We have three speakers scheduled for today. First up, we'll have Rob Schweitzer, Director of Fire Center Operations for the BC Wildfire Service. Next, we'll hear from Peter Brach, Executive Director, Regional Operations with Emergency Management BC. And finally, we will hear from Deputy Chief John Hogan of the Lytton First Nation. We are now ready to go live. A reminder to media on the line, please press star one to enter the queue. I will now hand it over to Rob Schweitzer, Director of Fire Center Operations for the BC Wildfire Service. Good afternoon. This afternoon, the BC Wildfire Service was called in to respond to the Nohoman Creek Wildfire, which is number K70580. And it's located approximately 1.7 kilometers northwest of Lytton on the west side of the Fraser River. The events of 2021 and the impacts to the village of Lytton and the Lytton First Nation are forefront in our minds. Many of my colleagues were significantly impacted by the Lytton Creek Wildfire last year. We ask for your respect and kindness as we report out on this new incident. Our primary objective is the safety of the crews and the residents who are currently impacted. So currently, the BC Wildfire Service has four initial attack crews on site with two unit crews as well. And they're responding with the support of helicopters and air tankers. The fire is currently estimated at 25 hectares in size. And the cause is currently unknown. Crews will continue to work through the evening and overnight as required. The RCMP and local fire department are also responding to this fire. Gusting winds in the area this afternoon are impacting the fire behavior. And crews on the air and in the ground are seeing and observing moderate fire rates of spread. The incident is highly visible from Highway 1, the village of Lytton, Lytton First Nation and surrounding communities. And just for information, our app, the BC Wildfire Service mobile app has a glitch in the system. It's actually reporting the fire as igniting at 5.44 a.m. this morning. I can confirm that is incorrect. The fire was initially reported at 12.45 p.m. this afternoon. So 12.45 p.m. this afternoon was the first report of this wildfire into BCWS. All wildfires are dynamic incidents and we will continue to provide updates as they become available. And for the latest information, please visit bcwildfire.ca or follow the BC Wildfire Service on Twitter or Facebook. EMBC and Lytton First Nation are here to provide an update on the current evacuation and orders in the area and I'll now turn it over to Peter Brock to speak on behalf of EMBC. Thank you. Peter, please go ahead. Thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Peter Brock. I'm the Executive Director of Regional Operations with Emergency Management BC. First I want to say that our thoughts are with everyone that was impacted by this fire, especially after going through and recovering from last summer's fire. As you know, this afternoon, people evacuated Lytton First Nation community due to a fire. We have received reports that approximately three structures may have been lost, but this has yet to be confirmed. Our condolences to the entire community. Please imagine BC is here to support the Lytton First Nation and those who have been forced to evacuate. Today, EMBC hosted a coordination conference call with attendees from Lytton First Nation, Thompson Nicola Regional District, BC Wildfire Service, First Nations Emergency Services Society, Indigenous Services Canada, and other key partners. Emergency support services are available for people who have been forced to evacuate. Supports include food, lodging, clothing, and may be provided for up to 72 hours or until their evacuation order has been rescinded. We understand people are registered through the online evacuee registration tool that EMBC has provided communities and the most important thing that the public can do right now is to prepare yourself and your family for any potential fires in your areas and please avoid any at all activity that may result in a wildfire. Thank you very much. And now we will go to the Deputy Chief John Hogan of Lytton First Nation, John. Please go ahead. Yeah, I want to thank the two speakers before me and we do want to thank everybody for the quick response to this fire we have gathered here and have put in place an evacuation order for IR23 in Homine and Lytton IR9B. So we have three elders that are in the direct line of this fire and we're working to make sure that they're safe and that we can get the fire out as soon as possible. We are experiencing another fire that was told to be in the Hellsgate area. So we have to be prepared for many things on really short notice. Thank you very much. Thank you so much to the Deputy Chief. A reminder to media on the line. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star one to enter the queue. You should hear a tone in response to indicate that you have indeed joined the line. If you do have a question, please ensure you direct it to the appropriate person. And I will pause for a second to allow folks to join. Our first question today comes from Callie McTavish of CBC. Callie, please go ahead. Hi. You mentioned that structures were potentially lost. Can you confirm that people have been evacuated? Can you hear me? Hi, Callie, I can hear you. Just let me bring it up again. Two, on the line, you were asking about folks who had been evacuated. Callie, is that correct? Yes, I was asking about evacuees. OK, Peter or Deputy Chief, John, could you please respond to the question? Yes, we have had people on the ground that are affecting the evacuation order for the properties that we have under our jurisdiction, and we have evacuation alerts posted for other areas north of the fire. So those are in place and underway. Thank you, Callie. Do you have a follow up? Yeah, I heard from one resident that they believed that the fire started at the old dump. Has that been, have you heard that? No, we have not. No source of ignition has been confirmed at this point. OK, thank you. Thank you, Callie. Our next question comes from Alex Buster of Global News, Alex, please go ahead. Hi, there. Thank you so much for taking my question here. So I just like your confirmation for some form of can you confirm how many crews are actually at the scene responding, please? Yes, so I'll take that one. So it's four initial attack crews. So that's four three person crews. For a total of 12 and then two unit crews and those crews are 21 each. So in total, that would be around 54 ground crews at this time with a couple officers on site as well, plus the aircraft, the helicopters and air tankers that are supporting those ground crews. Alex, do you have a follow up? Yes, thank you. Thank you for that response. In terms of the people who have been evacuated, can you give a precise or a rough number of how many people have actually needed to be evacuated? Not sure if I was needed. Oh, I believe so. I wasn't I haven't heard of a response so potentially. Yes, for our community, I believe there's approximately nine individuals that should be on the evacuation order. And I'll do one final call for the phone lines. If anybody has a question, please take this opportunity to press star one to enter the queue for the opportunity to ask a question and a follow up. Next, we go to Brianna, Charlotte of Canadian Press Brianna, please go ahead and are you there? Oh, can you hear me? Perfect, I can hear you now. Please go ahead. OK, sorry about that. Ecom has tweeted out that there are service outages in the area. Is do we know if this is related to to the fire? Yeah, hi, Peter Brock from emergency management, B.C. So we've heard the same reports that 911 service outages are occurring in the impacted area. It's worth mentioning that so far, the reports are that that's unrelated to the current fire. The reports that we have received is that there's five cell towers are in the affected in the area, along with some landlines. But that's just the last update we've received. And we are not sure of the status as of now, but that's the latest we've heard. You have a follow up, Brianna. No, I think that's it. Thank you. Thank you. Next to go to Tim Petrick, Castanet and he appears to have left the queue. So that concludes today's availability. Thank you, everyone, for joining. Have a great day.