7:00 a.m. live briefing: Vancouver rain, new B.C. lightning fires and Kuwait disruption

Vancouver is starting Saturday with light rain, British Columbia is absorbing a new lightning-driven wildfire surge outside Metro Vancouver, and Kuwait is reporting fresh damage and travel disruption amid the U.S.-Iran conflict.

Environment Canada observed light rain and 14.9°C at Vancouver International Airport at 7:00 a.m. PDT. Its forecast, issued at 6:23 a.m., called for mainly cloudy conditions, a 60% chance of showers this morning, clearing this afternoon and a high of 22°C. This is an airport reading, not a citywide incident report. 1

CHAT News Today reported at 6:00 a.m. PDT that almost 100 new wildfires had been sparked across B.C. in the previous 24 hours, with most attributed to more than 4,000 lightning strikes reported Friday. The report also says the latest fires have led to an increase in evacuation orders around Big Bar Lake. Big Bar Lake is outside Metro Vancouver; local evacuation boundaries and route instructions should be checked against the issuing authority before travel. 2

The latest AP update, at 6:12 a.m. PDT, says U.S. and Iranian strikes continued around the Strait of Hormuz. Kuwait authorities and the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation said Iranian strikes hit a water-desalination plant and an oil facility. AP reported several people injured at the oil facility, a fire at the desalination plant that forced several power-generation units offline, and injuries to several firefighters and a worker while crews fought two other blazes. Kuwait also briefly closed its airspace because of missile threats, while Kuwait Airways said it was rescheduling most flights to and from the capital. 3

Separately, CNN's live report updated at 6:47 a.m. PDT that an Iranian provincial official said a U.S. strike damaged a desalination plant in southern Iran and left 20 villages without water. CNN said the U.S. military had not responded to that claim at the time of the update, so the reported damage and water outage remain attributed rather than independently confirmed. 4