Video footage shot of the small British Columbia community of Faulder after a wildfire tore through shows empty foundations, the skeletal remains of vehicles and an occasional patch of green the fire missed.
The wildfire sprang around the dinner hour on Friday and by midnight a mass evacuation was launched for thousands from the Okanagan communities of Summerland and Peachland.
Faulder, to the west of Summerland, was one of the first communities to be overrun. Will Roelfsema supplied the video, which he said was taken by relatives still in the area.
The footage taken from a vehicle rolling down the street reveals the randomness of the fire, with blackened ground leading up to a green mowed lawn. No homes were left in the 70-second video, but a plywood shed was left standing alone.
He declined an interview Sunday, saying in a statement that he and his family were exhausted.
"We've had to evacuate twice now in the last two days and haven't gotten much sleep, especially since some of our family is still out there at Darke Lake," he said of an area that is under evacuation order because of the Bald Range fire.
The fire exploded in size to more than 100 square kilometres by Saturday afternoon, while the BC Wildfire Service said it had grown to 136 square kilometres on Sunday.
The B.C. government said there had been "significant structure loss" and it declared a provincial state of emergency on Saturday as more than 100 wildfires burn in the province, with almost half of them out of control.
RCMP say they are working to confirm a report that one person died in the fire west of Summerland.
The exact scale of the destruction is unclear, but a perimeter map put out by the BC Wildfire Service suggested the fire rolled over numerous homes on its way to the waterline north of Summerland, and social media videos showed multiple homes ablaze as residents fled, with fire on both sides of the road.
The service said Sunday the firefight would be "challenging due to shifting winds."
"If skies clear, fire behaviour will increase significantly due to the breaking of an inversion and resulting in increased winds. Fuels remain exceptionally dry and require very little wind to transition fire from the surface into the crowns of trees," it said.
It said helicopters and airtankers were supporting the firefight but smoke and poor visibility may hamper those operations.
About 10,000 homes are now under evacuation orders in Summerland, Peachland, the regional districts of Okanagan-Similkameen and Central Okanagan, and the Penticton Indian Band lands.
More than 3,200 homes are under evacuation alerts that stretch north past Peachland to Highway 97C, and south past Penticton on its western outskirts.
Greg Krauter, who was at the evacuation centre in Penticton on Sunday surrounded by six of his seven goats, said his property is on the crest of the hill and they watched the fire much of Friday night and knew it was time to leave when the power went out.
He said he went back Saturday and his home is still standing, but there were smouldering tree stumps and at one home he saw a fiery geyser of natural gas burning.
The BC Wildfire Service said the fire started Friday afternoon, but Krauter said he saw smoke earlier in the day from his home that overlooks the valley.
"The waterbombers didn't start right away. It was a long time before the waterbombers showed up."
Greg Krauter, who was forced to evacuate his Summerland property with his seven goats in the middle of the night due to the Bald Range wildfire, walks with three of them outside an evacuee centre, in Penticton, B.C., on Saturday. The Bald Range wildfire in British Columbia's south Okanagan region has forced 20,000 people out of their homes in the Peachland and Summerland areas.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck
The Interior Wildlife Rehabilitation Society said the fire swept through their facility in Summerland so fast that they were only able to escape with their own pets and the animals in their care.
The post added that they watched on the security cameras as the flames engulfed the entire compound, before the power went out and everything went black.
The fire near Summerland is one of four wildfires of note in the province, all of them threatening homes or communities.
The wildfire service said in its update on Sunday that elevated fire behaviour was expected to persist in the southern third of the province.
"Showers and thunderstorms are forecast in Cariboo, Prince George, and Southeast fire centres. These weather conditions also present the risk of dry lighting through the next 48 hours."
While the number of homes lost in the Bald Range fire hasn't yet been revealed, more than 120 buildings in the Cariboo have been destroyed and the chief of the Okanagan Indian Band said 230 homes were lost in a wildfire a week ago.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 9, 2026.
By Brenna Owen | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.