Boater attempts to extinguish blaze before fire crews arrive

An unidentified man uses his boat to put out a grass fire before fire crews arrived. Image Credit: SUBMITTED/Lorrie Jane Arnott

July 29, 2017 - 6:55 PM

KAMLOOPS - Lorrie Jane Arnott and friends were out on the Thompson River this afternoon, July 29, when they saw signs of a wildfire off Shuswap Road.

Arnott said she witnessed another boater trying to put out the fire before fire crews could arrive on the scene.

"(The unidentified man) made a couple passes before I started filming," Arnott said, in a phone interview with iNFOnews.ca.

At the time, Arnott was out boating on the Thompson River when she noticed smoke on the horizon and could hear a boat roaring up the river.

In the video, the boater makes multiples passes with his boat trying to spray water on the grass fire that occurred this afternoon.

"He made a huge difference," Arnott said, "he created a rooster tail and sent a plume of water on the fire."

As you can hear in the video, Arnott kept telling others to give the boater room.

"There were other boaters there," she said, "I just kept telling them to give him room."

The fire was just off the road and it "seems like it was a fire from a cigarette but I don't know that for sure," said Arnott. Luckily, she said fire crews were on the scene right away to contain the blaze.

The video on her Facebook page has already received over a thousand views and 249 shares as of 6:30 p.m.

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