The Langford Fire Department was busy responding to what they describe as easily preventable fires this weekend.
Some fires were started by improperly disposing of cigarette butts, and chief fire prevention officer Lance Caven said he hopes to raise awareness about this.
“Unfortunately the leading cause we’re finding is from carelessly discarded cigarettes,” Caven said. “We just want people to be aware that as the weather changes to use your common sense, and there’s lots of different options for putting out your cigarettes other than tossing out the window of your vehicle.”
Caven urged people to buy cigarette disposal containers, which are available many places including local dollar stores.
“There’s lots of after-market stuff you can get for your vehicle,” Caven said. “There’s non-combustible containers that you can put your cigarette butts in safely instead of tossing them on the ground.”
Since the summer is supposed to be another dry one, Caven hopes to get people thinking about fire prevention now.
“We just want to get our message out there early and let people know ‘listen, we’re going to have another really really dry summer, that’s our prediction’,” Caven said. “Let’s all start thinking about fire prevention and start thinking about these things before we have a significant fire in this area.”
Caven hopes that people will take steps to help prevent these types of fires.
“We’re hoping that people use their common sense and just trying to prevent these fires from happening in the first place will keep those numbers down low so that, especially from the wildfire perspective the forest service can focus on those fires that aren’t preventable from lightning strikes and whatnot,” Caven said.