District of North Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services members responded to almost a dozen brush fires, which they say appear to be the work of an arsonist.
The first 911 call came in around 6 a.m. when trail walkers noticed the flames burning just south of the gravel sports field at Ross Road elementary in Lynn Valley.
“It was a good-sized fire. It was probably 75 to 100 square feet with flames visible,” said assistant fire chief Mike Cairns.
The hikers informed them there were more fires burning farther down the trail and the department called in more crews.
While some of the fires were close enough to the trailhead that crews could hit them with their hoses, the rest required portable pumps using creek water. And Cairns is crediting some nearby residents who were bucketing water from the creek with preventing the small blazes from spreading.
“We appreciated the help from the residents on those,” he said. “The hard work with these sorts of fires is digging them out with shovels and picks to make sure you get to the seat of the fire and get it totally extinguished.”
North Vancouver RCMP and district fire prevention officers closed the trail to investigate the scene Wednesday morning.
“Just the amount of them and the proximity to the trail, these were obviously suspicious,” Cairns said.
This story was first reported in the North Shore News.
