Community in Crisis

Page 9

British Columbia is operating under a state of emergency as forest fires burn across the province.

As of Aug. 26, B.C. was dealing with 818 fires, 270 of those in the southeast corner of the province. More than 17,000 people had been ordered to leave their homes under evacuation orders, and many others warned to prepare to leave quickly, their communities under evacuation alert.

The state of emergency, which allows the government to draw on resources from across the province in order to fight the fires, has been in place since the beginning of August when the number of active fires sat at 353.

Among the communities evacuated was the Adams Lake Indian band, located in the province's southern interior. The evacuation order came in the late evening of Saturday, Aug. 16 when the McGillivray/Neskonlith Lake fire threatened the village, whose members live on two parcels of land, one near Chase, the other near Salmon Arm.

Joyce Kenoras is a councilor with the Adams Lake band. She holds the natural resources portfolio for the First Nation. When the order came, chief and council were in Williams Lake hundreds of kilometres to the northwest attending a cultural gathering and had to make their way back to the community to help.

By the time Kenoras arrived back in the community, firefighters from Adams Lake were already up on the mountain at work on the fire and the band administrator had begun to gather up important documents from the band office.

"We had an emergency preparedness plan in place, so he was already working at that and downloading files and taking land files out of offices and cheque recs and cheque books and anything else that we thought we might need in case we had to be completely out of there."

While most of the members evacuated, a group of community volunteers quickly went into action, cooking meals for the firefighters.

At first, it was just firefighters from the community trying to contain the blaze, which had been started the day before by a lightening strike. Then, when fire crews from the Ministry of Forests arrived, there was a communications breakdown and they didn't receive instructions to go in and fight the fire.

"So they remained sitting and waiting for their go-ahead while our guys went in and fought the fire, and literally saved the village and the land. Otherwise it could have come right over the mountain," Kenoras said.

"We had one of our members who has an excavator and different heavy duty equipment ... and some of our own people, they went right in and we gave them direction that 'You know what's going on in there. You just go ahead and do what you have to do. Don't wait for chief and council.' So they did, and we're really proud of them because they did a wonderful job doing that," she said.

"It was just a line of communication between the province," Kenoras said of the problem with orders getting to the ministry firefighters. "And I don't know if it had do with it being on Indian land. I would assume so. There was somewhat of a jurisdictional issue there. So there was a little bit of politics at work. But we worked our way through it, and now we've got a really good relationship. There's communication and correlation between ourselves and the ministry. We've now got a Ministry of Forests liaison who deals directly with us. So everything's opened up on that line."

About 300 people from the area were evacuated, including members of the Adams Lake band and the nearby Neskonlith band. The majority of them have been staying in Kamloops at one of the evacuation centres set up in the city.

"Of course, there were people who would not move. They just refused to leave. We've had a number of them who just won't go. And a lot of them are just Elders, and people who say, 'No, we've been through this before. We'll wait until we see it coming,' which is a little bit scary, but we're still keeping a close eye on them," she said.

The fire came so close to the community the night the evacution order was given that fire barriers had to be put up around some of the homes, Kenoras said.

"But since we began a better correlation with the province, we've gotten all the resources. They've got the firebombers in there, lots of helicopters, and I've been in liaison with the person through the ministries who has informed me that 'No, we're not going to pull any of the resources.' Because there is another really, really bad fire down in Kelowna. That's the one that's hitting all the news. It's just horrible what's happening down there. But they did assure us that we would keep the resources that they have dedicated to us, which is good."

The band has had its emergency preparedness plan in place for about five years, with the decision to develop such a plan made after another fire threatened the community.

"In 1998 there was a huge fire in Salmon Arm. The whole town of Salmon Arm was evacuated. At that time it was the largest evacuation in B.C. history-16,000 people. We were on alert at that time. And then there was another fire in 1974, which burned the whole backside of the mountain behind one of our reserves, and we were evacuated then. So the 1998 fire prompted us to put the emergency plan into place, so we did. And then we've had to keep updating it."

One of the things the plan helps the band do is keep track of its members during an emergency.

"We had to make sure we knew where everybody was, and keep track of where they're going." That includes giving consideration to people's health and making sure they have all the medications they require.

In addition to their plan, Adams Lake also benefited from the experience of the North Thompson band, which like Adams Lake is part of the Shuswap Nation. Earlier in the month, the McLure fire destroyed six homes on one of the North Thompson reserves.

"We had a tribal council update at the Shuswap Nation Tribal Council. And there were three communities involved in different fires at that time-North Thomson Inian band, Whispering Pines Indian band and Spallumcheen. The interesting information that came out of that is they told us, make sure you've got an emergency plan in place. They gave us a lot of information and advice on how to deal with things. And we took a lot of that advice and started to work on that information when our fire started. So it gave us a little bit of a heads-up," Kenoras said.

Putting their plan in place during a real emergency has pointed out some places where improvements could be made.

"Well, I think one thing we're going to do every year is make sure our people are certified," she said, referring to the province's requirement that all people going out to fight fires must have completed their S-100 fire suppression training. While the band has a number of members with years of fire fighting experience, if they didn't have their S-100, the province wouldn't allow them to fight fires.

"That's one of the things that I will do for my department is make sure we get as many certified as want to be with this process," she said.

"We do have our own fire department, which has been a godsend for us. Not all bands have a fire department. We've got a wonderful volunteer fire department, with about 14, 15 members on it. So we also need to get a new fire truck, which is another thing."

The crisis has highlighted the importance of making sure emergency equipment and supplies, like generators and water tanks, are kept at the ready. "So that when the time comes, you can get to your resources and have an inventory showing where everything's at, and keeping it updated," she said.

"And I guess the thing that's important here is that when you're in a crisis like this, I don't really believe that it's up to the chief and council. We've had to tell our people 'Just do what you think you have to do, you know? Don't wait for us. Don't wait for us to give you the go-ahead.' Because, like, when the fire broke out, we were at the Secwepemc gathering doing what we doas council and chief, and we had to just rush home. And at that point, if they waited for us, you know, we could have lost our village."