100-year-old heat record broken in B.C. Friday

Penticton, B.C., is seen in this undated image. (Shutterstock)

As was predicted, some communities in B.C. experienced their warmest May 10 on record Friday, when the mercury rose to over 30 C in parts of the province.

In Penticton, a new daily temperature record for May 10 hadn’t been set in a century until Friday. The previous high in that city was 28.9 C way back in 1924. It hit 29.7 C on Friday, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada.

The warmest record-breaking temperature was in Lytton, where it reached 33.9 C, surpassing the old record of 33.2 C from 2019.

All but one of the record-setting temperatures was recorded in the Southern Interior. Dawson Creek, in B.C.’s northeast, narrowly beat its 1969 record of 25 C with a Friday high of 25.2 C.

In the 131 years weather records have been kept in Princeton, the mercury has never risen to 30 C on a May 10, but it did on Friday. The old high for the day was 28.3 C in 1949.

The fifth record to fall Friday was in Merritt, where it reached 29 C, another marginal increase over the city's 2013 record of 28.8 C.

ECCC notes that its record summary may contain preliminary or unofficial data.

Officials had warned of increasing wildfire activity amid the weekend heatwave. That prediction also came true, as 12 wildfires burned out of control in B.C. on Saturday. In the 24-hour period between Friday and Saturday evening, 11 new fires sparked, according to the B.C. Wildfire Service. 

A “wildfire of note” sparked on Friday afternoon near Fort Nelson, which exploded in size and forced the evacuation of the entire town and nearby First Nation.

Temperatures are forecast to remain high through Sunday in much of the province.