The Newfoundland and Labrador government is expanding its ability to assess forest conditions with the purchase of 13 new weather stations. According to a list of recently released procurement contracts, in December the Department of Forestry, Agriculture and Lands awarded a contract for 13 new weather stations from British Columbia-based FTS Forest Technology Systems Ltd. for $466,927.42, exclusive of HST. …Forestry spokesperson Linda Skinner said these new weather stations are needed because wildfire analysts and managers use weather data to anticipate how fire will behave and how it could spread. “Integrating additional weather stations into the current network on the landscape will provide us with more refined and representative weather data for local areas and increase the quality of the data we use to share daily forest fire hazard ratings with the public,” she wrote.