Parks Canada more than halfway through creating wildfire safety barrier

There's a big logging operation underway just west of Lake Louise. Parks Canada is a little past halfway through creating a safety barrier meant to stop wildfires from going too far and to give fire crews a place to stand and fight.

There's a big logging operation underway just west of Lake Louise.

Parks Canada is a little past halfway through creating a safety barrier meant to stop wildfires from going too far and to give fire crews a place to stand and fight.

It's not a sight you'd expect to see in a national park, but a large strip of trees is being removed from the boundary of Banff and Yoho to give firefighters a chance.

"This area is prone to lightning strikes, so we're looking at creating a break in the fuels on the landscape to protect the communities of Field and Lake Louise in the event of a wildfire," said Shelley Tamelin, Parks Canada wildfire risk reduction manager.

The problem is a forest of tightly packed lodgepole pine that hasn't burned in nearly a century.

"There's just not a lot of natural openings left. That gives us a problem from a fire management perspective," said John Large, Parks Canada fire vegetation specialist.

"If we're coming into a fire and looking at areas where we can stop it or hold it for some suppression, we just don't have many options right now."