UPDATE: 12:05 p.m.
The power is slowly being restored to areas of Salmon Arm as BC Hydro crews are on scene.
However, those living near Mara Lake continue to be in the dark. There are still more than 600 BC Hydro customers without power, Tuesday afternoon.
A wildfire has now sparked above Highway 97A, near Two Mile Road and the Sicamous Landfill.
There is a tactical evacuation underway of homes nearest to the fire in Electoral Area E.
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Power is out to several areas of the Shuswap, Tuesday morning.
BC Hydro is reporting 646 customers are affected by the outage from the north end of Highway 97 A near Mara to the south end towards Sicamous.
Downtown Salmon Arm is also in the dark, with power out south of the Trans-Canada Highway, affecting more than 2,400 BC Hydro customers.
Traffic lights on Highway 1 area also not working.
It’s unclear what caused the outage, but several wildfires are burning in the area.
The Bunting Road wildfire, near Mable Lake, is an estimated 600 hectares in size and an evacuation order has been issued for the 10,000 to 17,000 blocks of Mable Lake Forest Service Road.
The Hunakwa Lake wildfire near Seymour Arm is an estimated 1,100 hectares and burning out of control. The Columbia Shuswap Regional District has issued an evacuation alert for the community of Seymour Arm.
READ MORE: Evacuation alert issued for Three Valley Gap properties along lake
READ MORE: Wildfire smoke continues to cause air quality issues in the Okanagan-Shuswap
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