N.L. residents on edge as fires close in

Communities running out of food, preparing for 24-hour notice evacuation

Bags packed and waiting beside their front door, Krista and Pat Morgan are nervously watching a blazing menace creep toward them.

“There’s a major raging forest fire not very far from us, and it’s headed toward us,” says Krista. “I’m just trying to stay calm, though. Trying to not let it worry us too much, or anybody else around us.”

The smoke from the Bay d’Espoir Highway fire, about 20 kilometres to the southwest has, for the past three days, been blanketing Bishop’s Falls, N.L., where they live. On Sunday, Morgan said, it was almost intolerable.

The province, battling uncontrolled wildfires for the past two weeks — the worst forest fires it has seen in more than 60 years — has declared a state of emergency for the entire region, and residents of Bishop’s Falls, as well as nearby communities, have been told to prepare for a mandatory evacuation on 24-hour notice.

Voluntary evacuations have already begun; the province has been running buses twice a day from a nearby Salvation Army church to a shelter run by the Red Cross at Deer Lake, 230 km to the west.

Krista and Pat are staying put for the time being, but they are cautiously monitoring the fire burning to the southwest. If it gets within 10 km of town, they say, they won’t wait for the evacuation order; they’ll pack those bags by the door into the car and head west, out of the danger zone, toward Deer Lake or Corner Brook.

“The winds here, they turn so quickly and so fast, and nobody can predict what Mother Nature has in store for us,” Krista said.

The couple, who between them own a number of businesses in Bishop’s Falls, worry about what would happen if that fire swept through their town.

“I have a good friend in Kamloops, B.C., who goes through this every summer. I’ve been kind of living it vicariously through him for the last few years.

“We’re definitely worried about it. Everything we’ve ever worked for is here.

“But at the same time, it’s all material things. Nothing that can’t be rebuilt. It would suck if we lost these ones, but that’s the world we live in, right? Our turn.”

In the southern Newfoundland town of Harbour Breton, deputy mayor Roy Drake says his community, cut off by the fires, is running out of food.

Roy Drake said Monday he figures the three grocery stores in town will be out of food within the next day or two.

Drake said he owns one of those stores — the smallest of the three in the town of about 1,600 people — and already, there’s not a jug of milk or a loaf of bread left on any of his shelves.

“Things are starting to get stressful for most residents,” Drake said in a phone interview from the town hall. “We need to get food in within a day or so to help us out. Not just for Harbour Breton, but for the entire region.”

For the past two weeks, forest fires have forced officials to intermittently shut down a remote, 200 kmlong route that connects the main highway across Newfoundland with the island’s Connaigre Peninsula, which is home to the towns of Harbour Breton, Hermitage and Conne River. The last time the road was opened was last Thursday morning, according to the Department of Forestry’s regular Twitter updates.

The province has declared a state of emergency stretching from the Connaigre Peninsula up the highway to the towns of Bishop’s Falls, Grand Falls-Windsor and Botwood, largely because of smoke and air-quality concerns.

In a video posted to social media Saturday night, Premier Andrew Furey described one blaze as the largest the province has seen since 1961. As of Sunday, the provincial government reported four active fires covering about 10,800 hectares.

The Canadian Red Cross has set up emergency shelter for those stranded north of the fires in central Newfoundland, and Quebec has sent firefighters and aircraft to help battle the flames.

For those stranded south of the fires on the Connaigre Peninsula, the provincial Transportation Department has enlisted a ferry to start bringing supplies to stranded communities and to help people leave.

The ferry is expected to arrive Tuesday. The timing will be tight, Drake said, noting that the ferry will be docking in the neighbouring town of Hermitage, which needs its own supplies and which is still about 50 km away from his community.

“I’m not sure that ferry is going to be able to accommodate what we may need in terms of supply on Day 1,” he said, adding that he’d be focused on sorting out how and when the needed supplies might arrive in his town.

David Neil, a warning preparedness meteorologist for Environment and Climate Change Canada, said the fires were started on July 24 by a lightning strike, in the midst of an abnormally warm and dry summer.

“This is a very unique situation,” he said, though he was hesitant to pin it directly on the province’s changing climate.

Neil said there are about 10 millimetres of rain forecast for the area Tuesday.

“It’s not a great deal of rain,” he admitted. “But at the very least, it should bring some help to the folk trying to contain the fire.”