Slowly but surely, Quebec has started to make progress in its battle against the forest fires, the smoke from which covered a large part of North America last week. "We are genuinely pleased with what has happened in the last 48 hours," said Philippe Bergeron, a spokesperson for the Quebec forest fire agency, on 9 June. He explained that some fires had been extinguished and several larger ones contained. Canada is currently battling more than 400 forest fires across the country.

Evacuated residents of the province hope they will be able to return home soon. On 9 June, the Quebec provincial government announced that it had granted 1,500 Quebec dollars (1,120 US dollars) to each household whose inhabitants had been forced to evacuate the province due to the fires.

Despite improvements in the situation in Quebec, officials in another of the country's provinces – British Columbia (BC) – warn that the upcoming fire season could turn out to be quite wild.
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