Climate survivors demand more support for wildland firefighters

In 2023, during the wildfires that tore through suburban Nova Scotia, Jenny Saulnier was alone with the family dog cooking dinner while her son and husband were at the hockey rink. 

It was then she was alerted that the fire was only nine kilometres away. As the fire approached, orange flames cast a threatening orange glow in her backyard. She grabbed the family dog Wesley and jumped in the car. She met a wall of traffic. When she called 911 they told her that if the flames got too close, she should try to escape on foot.

Saulnier knew if that happened, she wouldn’t survive. “I called my son and husband and told them I loved them if anything were to happen to me.” 

As she fled, she saw firefighters running headlong into the flames.

Saulnier and other climate survivors delivered a petition calling for more support for wildland firefighters to legislators on Parliament Hill Wednesday. The group, which included a 20-year veteran of wildfire firefighting and two members of the Okanagan Indian Band, was organized by My Climate Plan, led by Adam Lynes-Ford, the organization’s co-founder.

The petition, gathered this summer and signed by 6797 people, is also being delivered to provincial legislatures today. The group planned to meet with several MPs including, Steven Guilbeault, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change, Laurel Collins, NDP environment critic, Dane Lloyd, Conservative emergency preparedness critic, and Elizabeth May, Green Party leader. 

Harold Larson had 20 years of experience on fire lines in the bush of Alberta. He has seen the fire season grow longer and the fires grow larger. He knows first hand how brave and skilled wildfire firefighters are, and yet, many do not return after the first year on the line. The work is too hard on the body and the pay is too low.

One Summer, his crew worked 49 out of 54 days with each day at least 12 hours on the fire line. 

“There was little sleep and the fires were relentless, but we knew what we needed to do to protect our communities,” he said. “That's the kind of commitment firefighters bring to the job, but that commitment comes at a cost.”

Alberta wildland firefighters are paid a starting rate of $22.44 and work their way up to about $30 an hour. It’s close to the Canadian average of $25 an hour which is low pay, given the sacrifices, Larson said. Wildfire firefighters are in the bush for months of the year, missing family milestones and time with family. 

Many wildland firefighters are exposed to high levels of small particulate matter and are at higher risk for cancers and lung disease. And yet, wildfire firefighters remain without pensions, fair pay, benefits and stability, Larson said. 

“The future of wildland firefighters isn't just a summer job, but a respected career,” he said. “Because investing in wildland firefighters isn't just about protecting our natural resources and properties, it's about protecting the people.”

Larson wants to build national standards that will attract and retain experienced firefighters. It’s a dream Larson wishes had been a reality for himself. He left wildland firefighting to join conventional firefighting, which provides a pension and more time with his family. 

The group is also calling on more support for Indigenous fire guardians to revive more traditional practices for forest and wildfire management. 

Today, cultural burns that help reduce the dry brush that fuels fires are organized at a community level, instead in a regional way, said Michael Conlin and Rosalie Yazzie, members of the Okanagan Nation. Their family lost six of the 12 homes in their nation in recent years to fire which drove home for them the importance of more support for firefighters and traditional fire practices. Without more firefighters, community members, including elders who have lost homes to fires, will continue spending months, if not years, living in hotel rooms.

One of the things that stand out and sound to me is what reconciliation actually means,” Yazzie said. “And it's more than just pretty words.

Matteo Cimellaro / Canada’s National Observer / Local Journalism Initiative