Record rains in Alberta this summer have given way to an almost-predictable stat of the opposite kind: zero wildfires. The province’s wildfire dashboard showed none in any of its 10 forest areas on Tuesday. As of Aug. 11, Alberta Wildfire is reporting no wildfires of note. A year ago, the province was enduring heat waves while reporting 47 active wildfires. The 2025 wildfire season ended up as the second-worst on record nationally, with more than 89,000 square kilometres burned across Canada. That followed a record season in 2023, when the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre reported that 185,290 square kilometres burned across the country — more than double any other year since 1983 — including 18,371 square kilometres of forest in Alberta, according to Alberta Wildfire. To date in 2026, 688 wildfires have burned 177.2 square kilometres of forest in the province, compared to 990 that burned 6,705 square kilometres of it a year ago. Of this year’s 668 fires, 141 of them were in northern Alberta’s High Level Forest Area, accounting for 137.2 square kilometres of forest, or 77 per cent, that has burned province-wide. The Lac La Biche Forest Area sits second on the list with 23.9 square kilometres burned, while the Rocky Mountain House Forest Area has had 12.6 square kilometres go up in flames. Last month, federal officials said this year’s wildfire season has been more manageable because of heavy rain in the southern Prairies and eastern Quebec, while higher-than-normal temperatures were forecast in the northern Prairies, Ontario, much of Quebec and the Northwest Territories. This year, more than 41,000 square kilometres of forest have burned nationally.
