B.C.'s wildfires have burned the equivalent of nearly 700,000 Canadian football fields of land already this season

VANCOUVER -

The latest data from B.C.'s provincial government is providing a clear picture of just how devastating this year's wildfire season has been.

The province has provided daily updates with what it calls "quick statistics" about the fires, and the latest showed 567,950 hectares of land has been burned this year.

Putting it into perspective, Canadian football fields measure 8,152 square metres, or 0.8152 hectares – a bit larger than south of the border – meaning the area burnt by wildfires is the equivalent of about 696,700 Canadian football fields.

In NFL football fields, it's 1,063,208.

The City of Vancouver is 115 square kilometres, so the amount of land burned by wildfires is 49.3 times the size of the city. The metropolitan region is about 2,877 square kilometres. The wildfires have burned nearly two times that area.

If the fire-scorched land was all in one place, it could hold 18 parcels of land the size of Kamloops, 26 the size of Kelowna or 291 the size of B.C.'s capital, Victoria.

The Greater Toronto Area could fit inside nine times.

OTHER NUMBERS

Currently there are 292 wildfires considered to be active in B.C., according to the provincial wildfire service's interactive dashboard. Of those, 108 were sparked within the last week. A little over one-tenth of the fires were ignited in the last two days.

Since April 1 there have been 1,372 fires noted in B.C.

In terms of resources, the province said 3,612 firefighters and other personnel are currently fighting. Nearly 600 of those are from out-of-province.

There are 204 helicopters and planes supporting crews on the ground.

Sixty-three evacuation orders were in place as of Wednesday evening, issued for a total of 4,228 properties in B.C.

Another 103 areas are under evacuation alert, or 21,403 properties.