wildfires

Bill Moore, the region's executive director of community safety, told a news conference that about 200 people would be part of the grim tour through subdivisions northwest of the downtown, which fire officials said would be safe to enter for a short time

The funding, earmarked in Budget 2022, promises $28 million over five years to train 1,000 new community-based firefighters. The pilot involves nine Indigenous organizations and communities.

State Farm also cites the inflation of construction costs in a statement that comes after increasing wildfires in the state.

In all, there were four wildfires in the province burning out of control on Thursday, including the massive Barrington Lake fire in Shelburne County, which grew to more than 200 square kilometres despite a constant bombardment of water and fire retardant from a fleet of water bombers and air tankers.

Mike Mercredi, a volunteer firefighter from Fort Chipewyan, Alta., says he is among a group of community members on standby who have been setting up sprinklers on neighbourhood streets as crews work to contain the flames north of the hamlet.

"The fire was raging at such an incredible pace that I just wanted to save somebody else's house while I could," volunteer firefighter Mark Zawidzki said.

A summer forecast warns western wildfires will likely continue to be “a major concern," with higher-than-normal temperatures expected when the second fire season ramps up in July and peaks in August.

A hamlet in northern Alberta has been placed under an evacuation order as a wildfire burns nearby.

As an unprecedented string of wildfires in Nova Scotia continued to burn out of control for a fourth day, fire officials were hoping for a break in the dry, windy weather.

Fire officials said that with the return of dry, windy conditions, there could be a "reburn" in the evacuated subdivisions, which are spread out over 100 square kilometres.

Smoke from wildfires in parts of Alberta, British Columbia and now Nova Scotia has doctors warning pregnant people to take extra precautions against breathing in toxic particles.

The fire department in Slave Lake, Alta., had a long-standing plan for tackling wildfire encroaching on the community, but in May 2011, flames from a nearby forest blew over suppression efforts and destroyed several hundred homes and other buildings.

On Sunday, a wildfire forced more than 16,000 people to evacuate their homes in Hammonds Plains, Upper Tantallon and Pockwock, which are suburban communities about 25 kilometres away from Halifax. The fire is now around 788 hectares in size and has destroyed a dozen structures.

The provincial campaign is being fought over many issues, but climate change is the elephant in the room.

Nine fires are actively burning in the N.W.T., including an out-of-control wildfire about 32 square kilometres in size on the K'atl'odeeche First Nation that is believed to have been human-caused.