A wildfire has reached the edge of Fort Good Hope, N.W.T., where an evacuation order remains in effect.
Mike Westwick, the territory’s fire information officer, told CBC News on Sunday morning that no structures had been damaged, but fire crews are dealing with “a very serious situation.”
“A big team is working very hard to protect things in Fort Good Hope,” Westwick said.
“We have a fire right there and that needs to be our priority … we’re going to be working to protect that community today with everything we’ve got.”
Westwick said three fire crews are fighting the fire, with one more on the way. He said structure protections are being put up around the community and an incident management team is on the ground.
Westwick also said the fire is suspected to have started from an abandoned campfire.
More than 300 people evacuated from Fort Good Hope by Sunday morning, according to Municipal and Community Affairs spokesperson Laura Busch. She said 221 people are in Norman Wells, 12 are in Délı̨nę, and about 100 people have evacuated to a fish camp about 15 kilometres from the community.
She said only about 80 to 110 people are still in Fort Good Hope, most of whom are first responders.
As of 10:15 a.m., no further evacuation flights were scheduled to leave Fort Good Hope.
Evacuating by boat
Fort Good Hope resident Rose McNeely and 15 members of her extended family left the community by boat last night.
“I started thinking about my house, that’s the main thing,” she said.
McNeely, her family and their pets are now waiting it out with about 100 others at a fish camp.
“I feel safe, really safe,” she said. “The fire was so close to the community.
“My cat is scared. It’s a new place for the cat so the cat is hiding somewhere.”
McNeely said she doesn’t remember anything like this happening in her community.
“We’re up high so we could see the smoke from the town and then it moved right to the community. It was really black when it came more toward the community,” she said.
More firefighting crews needed
Fort Good Hope Chief Collin Pierrot told CBC News that he hopes more firefighters are sent to the community on Sunday.
“We don’t know what kind of weather conditions are going to be thrown at us today,” he said.
He said although many people left by plane, it was a slow process because of the size of the planes in the community.
“Not many people can get on the flight, 10 or 15, so we needed help to get larger planes,” he said.
The fire, which was about five hectares earlier on Saturday, had grown to an estimated 200 hectares later that day, Westwick said.
The fire grew again overnight, Westwick said, but with resources being directed to fighting the fire, an exact measurement wasn’t available yet.
Fire crews were focused on holding the fire at the road, and N.W.T. Fire has been working to get more structure protection into Fort Good Hope.
“That work continues — we’re just doing absolutely everything we can to protect what we can as this extreme situation unfolds,” Westwick said.