West Canada in grips of major heat wave

At a fruit stand in Vancouver, the cherries and blueberries are for sale about three weeks earlier than they normally would be, as a result of the record-setting heat wave here and in the province of British Columbia (B.C.) as a whole.

Maria, a berry seller, said the cherries were super early this year. "At least three weeks, or maybe more," she said. "Normally, (if) we are lucky, we have them for the first (week) of July, and we already have like two or three weeks with them."

Vancouver has seen little rain over the last month, with temperature climbing near or above 30 degrees Celsius for several days in a row. That's considered extreme heat in what is typically a mild west coast climate.

On a recent weekend, 64 separate temperature records were smashed across B.C. in west Canada, with the highest temperature of 40.6 degrees recorded in the southeast corner of the province.

Maggie Wilson, a local resident sitting in a beach close to downtown Vancouver, said she did not like this hot and dry weather. "My garden is getting dried up, and I'm struggling to keep everything watered," she said.

"I'm worried about what this is going to mean for the forest fire season," Wilson said.

Sarah Henderson, an environmental health scientist at the University of British Columbia, was concerned about the coincidence of hot weather with poor air quality.

"When we have forest fires burning in parts of the province, they will cause episodes of the poorest air quality that Canadians will ever experience," she told Xinhua on Thursday.

Recalling a similar heat wave B.C. experienced in 2009, which caused the death of an estimated 110 people around Metro Vancouver, Henderson said heat waves like that will likely become longer and more common.

"We have to expect more extreme events and them happening more frequently," she said.

With no end in sight to the heat, according to the latest forecast, British Columbians may be facing changes beyond an early berry harvest. Endi