Why does Canada have so many wildfires this season?

There were several fires burning across Canada as of Tuesday, with a few dangerously close to towns and cities.

One is near Fort Nelson, a town in the north-eastern corner of British Columbia, about 1,600km from Vancouver.

Some 3,400 people live in Fort Nelson and the Fort Nelson Indian Reserve. Most of them have since been evacuated due to the Parker Lake wildfire that is burning nearby.

On Tuesday, hundreds of people were also forced to evacuate near Fort McMurray in northern Alberta due to a fire burning 13km from the city. A 2016 wildfire in Fort McMurray destroyed 2,400 homes.

Residents in the city itself and other surrounding neighbourhoods are on an emergency evacuation alert, meaning they could be asked to leave at any moment if the fire grows.

In Manitoba, 550 people were evacuated in the north-west of the province due to a wildfire that started on Thursday near the community of Cranberry Portage.

The wildfire had grown to 31,600 hectares (316 sq km) as of Tuesday afternoon – nearly the size of Manitoba’s largest city, Winnipeg.

It spread at an unprecedented speed over the weekend, officials said, and could take weeks to be put out.

“I’ve been working in wildfires for 40 years. I’ve never seen a fire move like this fire moved,” Earl Simmons, Manitoba’s wildfire director, told reporters on Monday.

The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre estimates there are 135 active fires across the country and 39 of those are out of control.