Wild fire forces evacuation, leaves community untouched

A combination of fire and ice forced the evacuation of all 1,600 residents from a northern First Nation on May 31 and June 1.

But when they returned home after 10 days, they returned to a completely intact and undamaged Hatchet and Wollaston Lake First Nation.

“Just by the grace of God it burned all around us, as if someone had put a cup on the community and it burned all the way around it,” said band manager Mark D’amato.
The community suffered no structural losses and neither water nor smoke damage.

After three or four days of smouldering forest fires, the first starting in the south and threatening winds which fanned the flames erratically, D’amato and health director Mary Denechezhe issued an evacuation order and declared a state of emergency in the community. 
Because Hatchet and Wollaston Lake First Nation was in the midst of a band election for chief and council, the decision fell on the shoulders of the administration.
All residents had to be airlifted from the First Nation because the lake which bordered the community was in the middle of spring thaw. The ice was not thick enough to drive across, said  D’amato, but too thick to launch boats. It took 12 hours to airlift every one. Military aircraft were used to help.

Members were given shelter at SIAST facilities with 100 making the trip to La Ronge and 500 to Prince Albert, while the remainder went to Saskatoon. Health and Social Development Secretariat staff from the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations assisted at the two evacuation centres in Saskatoon.

An incident at the soccer centre in Saskatoon, which brought national attention of a different kind to the evacuation, will result in administration and band council revisiting the evacuation protocol.

“We do have an emergency evacuation plan ... (but) there was a flaw in the theory,” said D’amato.
In accordance to the plan, the elderly and sick were airlifted first. They were followed by mothers with young children. Seventy per cent of Hatchet and Wollaston Lake First Nation residents fall between the ages of eight and 18. Because of evacuation protocol 700 teenagers were evacuated with no adult supervision. Adding to the equation was the fact that they had all recently received their welfare cheques and the majority of teens ended up at the Henk Ruys Soccer Centre in Saskatoon across from which was a liquor store.

“With the combination of those three things, they just went nuts,” said D’amato. Fights broke out at the centre, resulting in the police having to be called in. Several arrests were made in connection with reports of fighting, intoxication and public disturbances. “When we got down there and got some adult supervision and some people there, it calmed down quite a bit.”

If another emergency evacuation has to take place that situation will not arise again, said D’amato.

Costs of airlift and the 10 days of living expenses for Hatchet and Wollaston Lake First Nation members will be covered by the province.

By June 10, all members had been returned by air to the community and elections had resumed.

La Ronge played host to a second set of evacuees around the same time the Hatchet and Wollaston Lake First Nation members were returning home. About 440 members of Lac La Ronge Indian Band who live in Hall Lake and Sikachu were bussed or driven to La Ronge when an evacuation order was issued for those northern communities on June 10 because of the threat of an encroaching fire south of the communities. The fire was caused by a lightning strike. The evacuation order was lifted on June 13.