A large, fierce-looking marine reptile with a mouthful of pointy teeth that made its home about 80 million years ago in Vancouver Island waters could soon become British Columbia's official fossil emblem.

A homecoming celebration for a memorial totem pole after an absence of almost 100 years will resonate far beyond the tiny Indigenous village in northwest British Columbia where it is being returned on Friday.

Buying the private property will ensure the integrity of the ongoing investigation and allow the First Nation to consider how to honour both the children who disappeared and those who were taken from their families to attend the school, Chief Willie Sellars says.

In a letter Thursday to Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem, Eby urged him to consider the "human impact" of rate hikes, which the bank has employed as an anti-inflationary measure, before making a decision next Wednesday.

British Columbia finished last fiscal year $700 million in the black, after forecasts swung between multi-billion-dollar deficits and surpluses.

The wildfire that has been rampaging through the Shuswap region of the B.C. Interior has also sparked a fight over whether local Opposition MLAs have been encouraging residents to disobey firefighters, or if the government is refusing to listen to critics of its response to the fires.

Fire chiefs from West Kelowna, Kelowna and Lake Country said homes have been destroyed in their communities, with West Kelowna sustaining the most losses and higher numbers still expected.

The fire was "exponentially worse" than expected, said Jason Brolund, chief of the West Kelowna fire department.

A heat wave that is expected to last most of next week has prompted British Columbia's government to warn people to prepare for sweltering conditions, but a repeat of the deadly 2021 heat dome isn't being forecast.

Firefighters on British Columbia's northern wildfire frontline wore black bandanas on Wednesday, August 9, 2023, while others carrying helmets and axes marched in Penticton during a memorial procession to honour colleague Zak Muise.