Amid the stress and unfamiliarity of her first fire season in the South Okanagan, Wendy Shah who lives up on Anarchist Mountain, channeled her tension into helping those that fight the flames.

Things like FiresSmarting your property and putting up sprinklers, evacuation orders and alerts were all new to Shah as someone who moved from Calgary only last year.

“That’s a whole different experience for me. I’ve never been in a situation like that,” said Shah.

Few days after the Nk’Mip Creek wildfire started, Shah’s neighbour, Brenda Arychuk, called her up to ask for help at the Anarchist Mountain Fire Department (AMFD), as the daily operations ramped up significantly.

“When she realized that this was getting to be kind of a big operation here with just feeding people that were coming and going, she called me and said, ‘you know how you said, I should ask for help? Well, how about I ask you for some help now?’” said Shah.

Arychuk rotates many hats in terms of her roles at AMFD. She’s the administrator, a medical first responder, among dealing with an array of other daily tasks.

“You don’t know what to expect in a fire department when you have a major fire like this. You don’t know how many people actually are there . . . you show up at your little hall, and there’s 50 people or more,” explained Arychuk, who still had to run out for emergency medical calls, and realized early that she needed help.

She then phoned up a few people in the community who all stepped up to help, and Shah took on the lead.

“That was huge for me, because during the fire, I was doing all the information officer stuff as well. So that was my primary focus,” said Arychuk.

The Nk’Mip Creek wildfire started initially on Monday, July 19, and by Thursday that week, Shah was in the full swing of things at the fire hall.

Everything from setting up food and drinks for the firefighters to communicating with those who wanted to donate food and picking up those donations.

With her background as a clinical dietitian, Shah also came to the role with a clear idea of what kind of high-fuel, quick food that firefighters need.

As fire crews filtered in and out all day, sometimes with up to 80 people throughout the whole day, food and drinks needed to be replenished constantly.

Although at first, Shah explained that knowing how much of everything they needed was unpredictable, the team quickly got themselves organized to know each morning what was in stock and what needed replenishing.

“The most important thing for these firefighters was keeping hydrated. The heat as well as just the work they were doing in the heat of the fire; I mean and it’s life threatening if they’re dehydrated and it affects their decision making, their productivity and just their overall health,” said Shah.

Protein-rich sandwiches and buns, granola bars, pepperoni sticks, and always a lot of sports drinks like Gatorade were a staple throughout the time. Since the crews don’t have time to sit down and have a meal, grab-and-go type foods were what was prepared.

Shah, along with a group of other women in the community who stepped up to help, better known as the ‘Grub and Scrub Committee’, were in charge of prepping long tables of food and drinks, and keeping them stocked throughout the day.

Additionally, Shah went on regular grocery store runs, sometimes filling up to four shopping carts of food and drinks, and hauling it back up to the fire hall.

Though constantly busy, Shah said volunteering at the fire department during the wildfire was in fact a great source of comfort for her. To know the work fire crews were doing each day, seeing their hard work, and knowing updates about the situation was much better than sitting in a hotel room on evacuation order, not knowing anything about the situation.

“Being up here kind of almost was a bit more reassuring for me, not that I was involved at all with any of the firefighting, but you could sort of sense that things were okay. We think things are a little better now. Everything is a bit calmer,” said Shah. 

“I think if you ask anybody on the mountain, they’ll say, as stressful as this was, we come out ahead with a stronger sense of community,” said Arychuk.