A remote Indigenous community in northwestern Ontario was forced to evacuate after a wall of smoke from a wildfire approached their homes. The community of Collins First Nation, also known as Namaygoosisagagun First Nation, had been told by the Ministry of Natural Resources that there was no immediate danger, but within hours, they were fleeing for their lives.
Evacuation Efforts
Miiyah Paavola, a resident of the community, described the evacuation as ‘very scary’ and said that she and five other people, along with three dogs and a cat, had to squeeze into a small aluminum boat to escape. The community has no road access, only a railway line and Collins Lake.
Paavola said that she couldn’t fully grasp the scope of the danger until her boat pulled away from the shore. ‘All you could see was orange and gray and it was very dark,’ she said. ‘When I was going across maybe about the second island, that’s when I watched it. I could just barely see the flames reach the shoreline. And it was a very thick wall of smoke that followed it very quickly.’
Aftermath
The fires that devastated Collins are part of a wider wildfire emergency unfolding across Canada, with 889 active fires spreading as of Thursday night, according to the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System. The community is now grieving what they have lost, with more than 30 homes destroyed, along with the administration office, school, community center, storage buildings, vehicles, and essential community equipment.
Chief Helen Paavola, Miiyah’s mother, said that the community is in despair, confusion, hurt, and mourning, but there is hope. ‘We are going home,’ she said. ‘We’re going to rebuild, and we are going home.’
The destruction of Collins has renewed questions about whether Ontario’s wildfire strategy is keeping pace with increasingly intense fire seasons. Lise Vaugeois, the Member of Provincial Parliament representing Thunder Bay-Superior North, said that at least a dozen communities across northwestern Ontario remain under evacuation or standby orders.
The smoke from the wildfires has spread hundreds of miles beyond northwestern Ontario, affecting people far from the fire line. Toronto, Canada’s largest city, woke up on Wednesday beneath hazy orange skies as the smell of wood smoke lingered in the air, prompting Environment Canada to issue air quality warnings and advise residents about the health risks of spending time outdoors.
Original reporting: El Paso News (HLL/CB) — read the source article.
