More than 6,000 people, about 15% of the population, were evacuated by military aircraft from remote communities in Canada’s Northwest Territories, threatened by a wave of more than 230 active wildfires.
A spokesman for the Northwest Territories fire department said that, separated by several hundred kilometers, the towns were “particularly difficult” to evacuate by land.
Mike Westwick added that a contingent of 120 soldiers was deployed on Tuesday to facilitate the airlift.
On the same day, authorities in the Northwest Territories declared a state of emergency for the entire region.
“We are in a crisis situation and our Government is using all the tools at its disposal,” said the Territorial Environment Minister, Shane Thompson, stressing that this allows him to “access resources and apply them.”
A state of emergency had already been declared Monday night in the capital, Yellowknife, which is surrounded by four wildfires to the northwest, north and southeast.
Yellowknife Mayor Rebecca Alty warned residents in parts of the capital to prepare for a possible evacuation if the fire, which is currently 20 kilometers from the city, continues to advance.
At least one hospital in Yellowknife, with a population of about 20,000, has already reduced its activities and transferred patients to other cities in southern Canada.
“It breaks my heart to think of the people of the Northwest Territories [sigla em inglês dos Territórios do Noroeste] fighting devastating forest fires,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on the social network X (formerly Twitter).
Neighboring British Columbia, the province hardest hit by the fires this month, exceeded 40 degrees Celsius for the first time this year, the environment ministry told news agency France-Presse on Tuesday.
The town of Lytton saw the temperature reach 41.4 degrees Celsius on Monday.
Canada is experiencing its worst bushfire season in its history, with thousands of fires already leading to the issuance of more than 200 evacuation orders this year, forcing some 168,000 people to temporarily leave their homes.
The fires emitted the equivalent of more than a billion tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), an unprecedented record, Canadian authorities said last week.
The value is almost equal to the annual emissions of Japan (1.12 billion tons of CO2 in 2021), the fifth largest polluter in the world.
The fires have so far burned 13.5 million hectares, the equivalent of the area of Greece, and almost double the area of the last absolute record, which dates from 1989 with 7.3 million hectares, according to the Interagency Center. Canadian Forest Fire.
Since May, Canada has received help from some 5,000 firefighters from 12 countries, including Portugal, in June.
Source: TSF
