“Shocking and terrible,” that’s how a local MP is describing a racist confrontation in a Surrey park that left a group of South Asian seniors and kids feeling terrified. A Surrey woman says her grandmother was in the park July 28 when two people approached and began yelling offensive things at the group. The portion of the incident was captured on video and posted to social media. She says she heard they also threw garbage at the group, and told them to “go back to India.” The Surrey RCMP says they are still trying to gather the full picture of what happened, as the members of the group did not call police. RCMP did receive a complaint from a third party on Wednesday that a group of men were causing a disturbance and shouting at women in the park. A “Rally against Anti-Asian Racism” will be held Tuesday at 7 p.m. in Aspen Park to gather the community together to show their support for the victims, and to call for an end to these hateful incidents. The rally is organized by the Stand with Asians Coalition and the local South Asian community.
Staff at the Afghan Kitchen in South Surrey are shaken and trying to get past an incident of vandalism over the weekend. Owner Hassib Sarwari says a man approached them asking for food just before closing Saturday night. Later in the night, on their way out, Sarwari and his staff noticed the man hanging around the parking lot and eventually made his way inside the restaurant’s temporary patio. “He pretty much started rearranging the furniture and made himself a nice place to stay,” Sarwari says but says while he was hesitant to let the man stay behind, he left the man alone for the night.
Cooler temperatures are in the forecast for later this week, but a shifting weather pattern could also bring winds and possible thunderstorms to B-C’s wildfire zones. Fire information officer Erika Berg says the numbers of fires in B-C have stayed in the 240-245 range over the past week, which is much different than previous weeks where there was a steady buildup of fires. She says fire crews have been holding their own over the past week, but the weather patterns could bring new challenges. Berg says wildfires have burned more than five thousand five hundred square kilometers since April.
BC Ferries accidentally released a sailing on the long weekend Monday that never existed in the first place. That’s what several passengers had to deal with this weekend after learning their trip off Salt Spring Island was not actually being offered by BC Ferries. BC Ferries says the sailings were “incorrectly built in our system for today’s Holiday Monday schedule,” and is apologizing to all affected customers. BC Ferries offered full refunds and asked passengers to use different sailings instead. One passenger said “They gave us a compensatory ticket to Swartz Bay, for which we had to wait about an hour at the ferry terminal. And then at Swartz Bay, there was another hour and a half delay to Fulford,” he said Monday. “So long story short, we did reach our final destination, but had to lose about three to four hours in this time.”
Canada will have two runners representing the country in the men’s 200m final Wednesday, the reigning silver medalist Andre De Grasse and Aaron Brown. A new Canadian record was set by De Grasse as he finished first in the third semi-final at a time of 19.73 seconds. It was also the fastest qualifying time of the semi-finals. Toronto native Brown qualified first in the second semi-final, third overall, after what appeared to be a virtual tie between the Canadian, Joe Fahnbulleh of Liberia and Noah Lyles of the U.S at 19.99. De Grasse already has one medal from the Tokyo Olympics, a bronze in the men’s 100m. Two Canadians also qualified for the men’s 5000m final, Justyn Knight and Mohammed Ahmed. It will be run on August 6.
However, the following day, video surveillance showed the same man had smashed their patio heaters “We’re still quite taken back by the incident. We have a very small team. We’re short-staffed as it is dealing with so many different challenges. We all work long hours, and then seeing something like this happen just breaks your heart because we pretty much put in all of our effort time in building the restaurant, making it nice, investing our time, money. Restaurant staff is concerned because they believe the suspect might be suffering from mentally illness, they hope he gets help so he gets well and can feel safe. Police say they have identified a suspect.
Christmas is months away, but B-C tree farmers say the heat dome turned many prized trees brown. Robert Russell of Sahtlam Tree Farm near Duncan says he’s never seen anything like it in his more than 50 years growing Christmas trees. He says he’s already told some suppliers the quality of trees may not be perfect this year due to heat damage. Russell says Douglas fir trees appear to have handled the heat but the higher value Grand firs are showing more brown than green.
Public health doctors say the country is seeing the beginning of a fourth wave of COVID-19. But they add how bad that wave gets will depend heavily on vaccinations. McMaster University infectious disease specialist Dr. Zain Chagla says because vaccines are working so well against severe disease, this wave isn’t likely to be anywhere near the crisis levels of the first three. He does not foresee major lockdowns. A recent report from the United States suggesting vaccinated people can spread COVID-19 as easily as unvaccinated people raised concerns about the effectiveness of vaccines. But the report also notes most infections are still occurring in unvaccinated people.
Smoke from British Columbia wildfires has resulted in flight cancellations and delays. Kelowna International Airport says flights in and out were cancelled due to thick smoke. A statement posted on the airport’s website says a wildfire northwest of Vernon has moved toward Okanagan Lake and a no-fly zone is posted above the fire, impeding planes trying to land in Kelowna. Passengers at Kamloops International Airport are being told to check their flights as air quality and airspace restrictions could cause delays or cancellations.
The B-C Wildfire Service is reporting more than 250 active blazes including 19 in the last two days despite light rain over parts of southeastern B-C over the long weekend. The wildfire service says the showers provided only a short reprieve over fires such as the White Rock Lake fire northwest of Vernon, which flared over the long weekend, growing to more than 300-square kilometres and forcing hundreds more evacuations. Environment Canada says showers are possible this week across much of southern and southeastern B-C, but warns any rain could also be accompanied by lightning storms. The wildfire service says more than 55-hundred square kilometres have burned since the start of the fire season on April 1st.
It’s been a week of steady progress in fighting B-C’s wildfires. Rob Schweitzer, with the B-C Wildfire Service, says the rain that fell over the weekend helped to curb the fire behaviour. But Schweitzer says they’re expecting a return to extremely dry weather in the next few days for the southern Interior, where some of the largest fires are burning. Meantime smoke in the air has disrupted airline flights at Kelowna and Kamloops.
B-C is reporting another surge in COVID-19 cases with 742 new positive tests over four days and incremental increases in the vaccination rate. There were 160 new cases Friday, 196 on Saturday, 185 on Sunday and 201 from Monday to today. Another person had died, for a total of seventeen hundred and 72 deaths since the pandemic began. There are 53 people in hospital and 19 of those are in intensive Care.
Canada’s public health doctors say the country is seeing the beginning of a fourth wave of COVID-19, but how bad that wave gets will depend heavily on vaccinations. The Delta variant of the virus is more contagious and becoming dominant in Canada but McMaster University infectious disease specialist Dr. Zain Chagla says because vaccines are working so well, the wave will likely not be severe.