Alberta, Canada Zapped With 23,000 Lightning Strikes Overnight, Starting 116 Fires

EDMONTON (CP) -- Alberta wildfire officers say they haven't seen anything like it in the last 15 years.

The province took about 23,000 lightning strikes from Thursday to Friday, sparking at least 116 new fires.

``We looked back to 1990 and didn't find another 24-hour period where we had that many,'' said wildfire information officer Patrick Loewen.

``While we are having flash floods in parts of the province, other parts of the province are extremely warm and dry.''

Some of the fires have been put out, but more than 100 are still burning and 36 are burning out of control, he said.

``It's the volume of fires that started, not so much the size. Many of them are quite small and we've been able to extinguish or bring them under control in a hurry.''

One lightning strike resulted in the evacuation of a Husky Energy oil site west of Zama City, nearly 900 kilometres northwest of Edmonton. A fire started by the lightning was not threatening the facility, Loewen said, but two workers were evacuated as a precaution and sprinklers were set up there just in case.

The situation could soon get worse. More hot, dry weather is expected.

About 1,100 firefighters, 100 helicopters and 60 bulldozers are being used to fight the fires.

Ten more air tankers - from B.C., Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba - have been added to Alberta's fleet of fire-dousing planes.

The largest fire is burning out of control in an area near the Alberta-Saskatchewan boundary, about 500 kilometres north of Edmonton.