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Firenado blazes out of control in British Columbia

A fire tornado is seen in Vanderhoof - REUTERS
A fire tornado is seen in Vanderhoof - REUTERS

This is the terrifying moment that a "firenado" sucked a firefighter's hose 100 ft into the air... before melting it.

As crews battled a record number of wildfires in westernmost Canada, they came up against a fire devil - a twisting vortex of orange cloud and flame near Vanderhoof, British Columbia.

Footage posted by MC Schidlowsky, a member of the team, on Instagram, showed three fellow firefighters struggling to hold down one end of the hose as the other disappears into the air.

One of them rushes out of their fire truck and gets pulled toward the funnel cloud but loses his grip on the hose, and turns back.

"Fire tornado destroyed our lines," Ms Schidlowsky said in a caption.

"It threw burning logs across our guard for 45 minutes and pulled our hose 100 plus ft in the air before melting it. That's definitely a first."

A fire tornado is seen in Vanderhoof - Credit: INSTAGRAM @MAR.LOWSKY
A fire tornado is seen in Vanderhoof Credit: INSTAGRAM @MAR.LOWSKY

Eventually the firenado grew to more than 200 feet tall, she added, but the smoke was too thick to see it clearly in the video.

A record 1.3 million hectares of forests in British Columbia were blackened by 2,066 wildfires in recent months, fueled by hot and dry weather.

Currently, 333 wildfires are still burning, according to the BC Wildfire Service, including 10 that have been burning since June.

A firefighter races to secure the hose - Credit: INSTAGRAM @MAR.LOWSKY
A firefighter races to secure the hose Credit: INSTAGRAM @MAR.LOWSKY

Last month, the regional government declared a province-wide state of emergency as Canada's military and crews from Australia, Mexico and New Zealand joined firefighters in trying to douse the blazes. It has since been lifted.

Meanwhile, cities from Vancouver on the Pacific coast to Winnipeg in the Prairies region about 2,300 kilometers (1,400 miles) to the east were blanketed over the summer with smoke from the fires, triggering air quality warnings.