Largest wildfire near Norman Wells
GNWT also now under fire from property owners for losses in other blazes
John McFadden
Northern News Services
Monday, August 1, 2016
LLI GOLINE/NORMAN WELLS
The biggest forest fire in the NWT as of late last week was a blaze burning 20 kilometres southeast of Norman Wells in the Sahtu region.
A helicopter picks up water from a lake about 50 kilometres east of Yellowknife on July 28 and then dumped on the nearby Reid Lake fire. - John McFadden/NNSL photo |
It was being fought by firefighters last week on the ground and in the air, according to Amber Simpson, spokesperson for the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (ENR).
"The crews are working on the western and southern flanks of the fire to prevent it from spreading towards Norman Wells," she said.
Simpson added 20 firefighters from Alberta who had been working on the fire were demobilized on July 25 and were replaced with NWT firefighters.
"Things are looking very good on that fire. There has been no reported growth toward the community of Norman Wells," said Richard Olsen, fire operations manager for ENR. "The larger growth has been to the south. We'll continue to mop up so things are looking really good on that one.
"There is still smoke and growth towards the south but the main objective was to block it in on the west side to keep it from moving north towards Norman Wells."
It is not believed that any buildings or infrastructure has been lost. No injuries been reported.
Meanwhile, there are two fires in the South Slave Region that have the attention of ENR. Both fires are about 55 kilometres southwest of Fort Providence. Crews are directly working on one of the fires while buildings and infrastructure are being protected in the other.
There were also two fires getting attention in the Dehcho Region. Both of them were burning near Fort Liard. One of the fires, only 2.5 kilometres from the community has now been declared out while the other, about 15 kilometres from the community was being fought as of late last week and is almost out, according to ENR officials.
In the North Slave Region, the fire still getting most of the attention is the Reid Lake fire, about 60 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife. Twenty Alberta firefighters were taken off that fire last week and replaced by NWT firefighters. It had claimed a lodge on Harding Lake and a cabin on nearby Pickerel Lake.
So far this season 163 wildfires have been reported in the NWT. They have burned some 176 square kilometres. Eighty-two of those fire have now been declared out, 62 are being monitored, 19 are being actively fought and 16 are out of control and being held, according to ENR.
The fire danger remains high in Yellowknife, Whati and Behchoko and low to medium in the rest of the North Slave Region. It was medium to high in the Inuvik Region where no fires are reported. The fire danger was high in Colville Lake and low across the rest of the Sahtu Region. In the South Slave - the fire danger was high in Fort Smith and medium to low across the rest of the region.
Meanwhile, a Yellowknife man, whose cherished family lodge was lost to wildfire fire in 2014, said he is not sure if the Department of Environment and Natural Resources has learned anything from the devastating forest fire season two years ago.
Rodney Kenny, whose family owned Moraine Point Lodge on Great Slave Lake about 110 kilometres southwest of Yellowknife, said he is closely following the story of Namushka Lodge. The lodge, located on Harding Lake, about 50 kilometres east of Yellowknife, which was destroyed by a forest fire on July 15.
He also said he has been reading media reports - such as in last week's News/North - about a fire in 2014 that consumed a homestead known as the Hoarfrost Lodge, owned by the Olesen family on the East Arm of Great Slave Lake.
A report, commissioned by the department, states staff were using outdated satellite imagery and thought that the fire was further away from the property than it actually was.
Kenny said he does not know if outdated maps were part of the reason firefighters were not able to save his lodge when fire surrounded it a few weeks after the Hoarfrost Lodge was lost.
"I read in the newspaper that there was some outdated data or a time delay of some sort," Kenny said. "I'm very interested in knowing what exactly that means. What are you using and how was it outdated? And how did that affect any or all the fire situations?"
Kenny said that after his lodge was burned, he tried in vain to arrange a meeting with the then-minister of Environment and Natural Resources (ENR) Michael Miltenberger. He said that meeting never happened, leaving him with more questions than answers about the fire that destroyed his lodge.
Unlike the Olesen fire and the Namushka Lodge fire, there was no one staying at the Moraine Point Lodge when it was burned. Kenny said he was in constant contact with ENR officials at that time to remind them where the lodge was. They reassured him according to Kenny but eventually they called him to say the lodge had been lost to fire.
Kenny did not want to talk about whether he is seeking compensation from the territorial government but said he is still wondering if anything positive has come from the two major losses of two years ago.
"I don't know if there were lessons learned from the 2014 fires. If there were why weren't they put into practice in 2016," Kenny said.
Richard Olsen, manager of fire operations for ENR, disagreed with Kenny's assertions that the department hadn't learned valuable lessons from the 2014 fire season.
