By Matthew Abrey
Chris Brydon is glad to be back in his Brent Road summer home after being told to evacuate due to the Mount Eneas wildfire.
“ (It’s been a) tense couple of nights and a lot of sleepless nights,” says Brydon. “You saw the pictures on the internet that looked pretty bad and it was just a miracle that the houses didn’t burn.”
Brydon, who is from Vancouver, spends his summers in the Okanagan. He was in Vancouver when the Mount Eneas fire broke out, four hours away from his family who was at the Brent Road property.
“The fire came up on the Thursday and they were evacuated, and I was lucky and fortunate my family had a place to go in Kelowna, and I came up on the Friday and waited with them on the Friday, and it was probably about 4 p.m. on the Saturday when we got the go-ahead to come back here,” said Brydon.
“There was fire right there, and it didn’t get to any of these homes here, so we’re pretty lucky.”
Brydon fully expected to come back to a house smelling of smoke and a yard full of ash and retardant, but to his surprise, he says none of that was really an issue.
“We got really fortunate with the wind, it was always just blowing in our favour which I think was a big factor in this thing because if the wind had turned and gone the other way, I’m sure there would’ve been a number of homes that would’ve been lost.”
All residents on Brent Road are now back in their homes, but a number of wildfires continue to burn out of control in the valley.
READ MORE: Okanagan wildfire round-up: Public urged to stay away from inactive wildfires
“Kudos to the firefighters and the Peachland firefighters that were here, because I know that they were here for three nights in a row, and they saved all these homes, so we were blessed that way for sure,” says Brydon.
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