Alec Salloum
Regina Leader-Post
With a fire raging seven kilometres away, Creighton’s mayor hasn’t been getting much sleep.
The blaze started Wednesday, and by Thursday, water bombers were attacking the fire close to the town. Mayor Bruce Fidler said there hasn’t been any “groundcrew access” to the fire so far, but hoped firefighters would be able to tend to the blaze from the ground by the end of the week.
“We did receive some rain this morning, but along with that came some lightning,” said Fidler in an interview Friday.
Winds have been favourable, he said, and though it’s still early in the process, things are “looking a little better today than it did yesterday.
“There is some smoke in the area but the wind is blowing the majority of the smoke away from town.”
Still, Fidler said that an evacuation alert for Creighton is in effect “just in case things happen to change quickly” and given the town’s proximity to the fire, which was considered uncontained as of Friday afternoon. Alerts ask residents to be prepared for a possible evacuation order.
“Some people, because it is so near to the community, of course they’re on edge.”
Fidler, and many others in the community, remember fires back in 2015 and 2016 that closed access to the community through Saskatchewan for about a month. (An alternate route through Manitoba was still open.)
“We have experienced this before, but, I mean, every time is different. It always keeps you on edge, that’s for sure,” said the mayor.
Fire crews are seeing about five to 15 new fire starts a day due to small cells of lighting moving across the province, said Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency (SPSA) operations vice-president Steve Roberts on Friday afternoon. As of 10:50 a.m. Friday, the SPSA was aware of 82 active wildfires burning in the province. Of those, 20 are not contained.
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“To put that in context, 24 of those are more than 100 hectares in size and 13 of them are more than 1,000 hectares in size,” said Roberts.
Since hot, dry conditions are expected to continue across Saskatchewan, the SPSA has issued a fire ban.
Open fires, controlled burns and fireworks were banned as of noon Thursday for Crown lands, provincial parks, recreation sites, the Northern Saskatchewan Administration District, and all land within 4.5 kilometres of provincial forest boundaries.
“We are making the decision to implement a fire ban to protect lives, communities, major infrastructure and resources from wildfire,” said Roberts in a media release sent Thursday.
Although many regions saw rainfall throughout June, forest conditions remain “extremely volatile, extremely dry and the risk of ignition is high.”
“We do not have additional capacity to take on unwanted fires that may start due to carelessness or negligence, so we’ve taken this step as precautionary advice,” he said Thursday.
There are 55 “Type 1” fire crews on alternating schedules to offer 24/7 coverage, explained Roberts on Friday. An additional 82 crews are ready to be activated as part of community programs including reserves in northern Saskatchewan, which would also work on alternating schedules.
It means that for the 82 fires in Saskatchewan, at any given time there are about 70 fire crews that can respond, said Roberts.
“I mean, to be honest, many of these fires may have two, three, five crews on them depending on the risk magnitude, how close to the community,” he added.
Roberts said air tankers were deployed to fight the fire, which is also close to the Denare Beach community, for six hours on Thursday. The two communities, as well as Flin Flon are all currently under an evacuation alert.
All of Saskatchewan’s crews are currently engaged in active fires in the province, with the exception of 21 firefighters deployed to the Northwest Territories last week. Those crews have been asked to return by the SPSA. Air tankers have been brought in from Manitoba to aid crews on the ground.
Saskatchewan has had 317 wildfires this season, 99 more than the five-year average of 218.
Wildfires can be reported by calling 1-800-667-9660, dialing 9-1-1 or contacting an SPSA Forest Protection Area office.
— with files from Larissa Kurz
