Thousands of Canadians are being evacuated due to forest fires, a state of emergency

On Wednesday, the board of the Canadian province of Manitoba called around 17,000 inhabitants of the northern and western parts of the province to evacuation due to fierce forest fires. International press agencies report this after a press conference by WAB KineW, the Prime Minister of Manitoba. KineW has declared the state of emergency in Manitoba, a centrally located province in Canada.

There are now 22 fires in Manitoba, which cover nearly 200,000 hectares of the province. Forest fires are more common in the area. On average, those burn around 70,000 hectares per year, writes The Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail. This week’s fires are raging in an area that is already three times as large. KineW speaks of one of the greatest evacuations « since the human teeth of the inhabitants of Manitoba ».

All five thousand inhabitants of the mining town of Flin Flon, on the western border of Manitoba, have to leave their homes, writes The Globe and Mail. They are taken care of on football fields and in neighborhood centers in the nearby city of Winnipeg and other cities in the province.

Two dead

The fire that threatens Flin Flon started last Monday in a town on the border with the province of Saskatchewan. In recent weeks, residents of other places in Manitoba also had to evacuate. Six hundred inhabitants of the northern Lynn Lake left their houses.

Two weeks ago a thousand people had to leave Lac du Bonnet, near Winnipeg. Two people died in that fire. The fire there destroyed 28 houses.

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