More people in northern Manitoba were told to leave their homes Saturday and Saskatchewan’s premier warned the number of evacuees in his province will likely climb as wildfires continued to threaten communities and send thick smoke into the air.
The roughly 600 residents of Cranberry Portage in northwestern Manitoba were placed under a mandatory evacuation order because fire had knocked out power to the community — a situation expected to last for days.
People in a few smaller communities nearby were put on a two-hour evacuation notice after a fire jumped across a highway.
“Please start getting ready and making plans to stay with family and friends as accommodations are extremely limited,” Lori Forbes, the emergency coordinator for the Rural Municipality of Kelsey, posted on social media.
An evacuation of Pimicikamak Cree Nation in Manitoba, which started earlier in the week, ramped up further on Saturday. Officials were expecting five flights to leave for Winnipeg by the end of the day.
“The wildfire has crossed the main road, and the area remains filled with smoke and ash,” Chief David Monias wrote on Facebook.
Manitoba’s Indigenous leaders, including Monias, told a news conference on Saturday that hotel rooms in the cities where evacuees are arriving are full, and they called for politicians like Prime Minister Mark Carney and Premier Wab Kinew to issue a directive to hotel owners to give evacuees priority.
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Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Grand Chief Kyra Wilson said it was one of the largest evacuations in the province since the 1990s.
“It’s really sad to see our children having to sleep on floors. People are sitting, waiting in hallways, waiting outside, and right now we just need people to come together. People are tired,” Wilson said at the news conference.
“We need to make sure that we have space for our people.”
In Flin Flon, Man., where the city’s 5,000 residents had already been evacuated, an out-of-control fire continued to burn very close to the community. There were no structure fires as of Saturday morning, but officials were worried a shift in the wind could bring flames right into the city.
Some 17,000 Manitobans have had to leave their homes due to fires, and the forecast in the Flin Flon region does not call for rain in the coming days.
More emergency centres across the province have been opened for evacuees, as far south as Winkler, 20 kilometres north of the U.S. border.
Thousands have also been affected by wildfires in Saskatchewan and Alberta, with 1,300 people in the community of Swan Hills northwest of Edmonton already forced from their homes.
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe told a news conference Saturday that ongoing hot, dry weather is allowing some fires to grow and threaten communities, and that the current figure of 8,000 fire evacuees could climb to 10,000.
Resources to fight the fires and support the evacuees are stretched thin, the premier acknowledged.
“The next four to seven days are absolutely critical until we can find our way to changing weather patterns, and ultimately a soaking rain throughout the north,” Moe said.
“That’s why we are asking people in the north to be very, very careful. We cannot manage and handle a single other fire.”
Manitoba’s daily fire bulletin on Saturday said there is a small chance of rain for some areas, but the rain could be accompanied by thunderstorms and the risk of more lighting-started fires. It said there could also be a risk of very strong winds in western Manitoba which could drive fire behaviour.
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