Community evacuated in northern Alberta as wildfire creeps closer to highway

A wildfire burns in northern Alberta on July 10, 2024. (Source: Alberta Wildfire)

A northern Alberta community declared a local state of emergency Thursday after wildfires close to it forced the evacuation of almost 1,000 residents.

The Little Red River Cree Nation declared the state of emergency a day after a wildfire burning 30 kilometres northwest of the unincorporated community of Garden River and eight kilometres north of the highway that eventually runs through it led to the evacuation order.

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Garden River is about 575 kilometres north of Edmonton and 195 kilometres east of High Level.

The evacuation has seen 981 residents relocate to John D'Or Prairie, High Level and Peace River.

Alberta Wildfire said in a media release Thursday that the fire, called HWF061, is classified as out of control and has grown to a size of more than 41,000 hectares. It was caused by lightning.

The provincial agency said 92 wildfires are actively burning in the province's Forest Protection Area, 29 of them classified as out of control.

Melissa Story, an information officer with Alberta Wildfire, said Thursday in a media conference more than 700 wildfires so far this year have burned more than 200,000 hectares of forest.

She said cool and wet weather this spring kept the number of wildfires and amount of land burned at average or below average levels, but that with recent higher temperatures, Alberta is "inching closer" to its five-year average for hectares burned.

"We've seen rapid growth on many wildfires due to the heat wave," Story said, adding that increased lightning activity started 99 of the 184 new wildfires in the province since July 1.

"As a result, the total area burned has doubled in the last 48 hours."

Story said rain forecast to arrive in northern Alberta in the next few days should offer some reprieve even though it won't extinguish the fires altogether."The weather outlook is for more seasonal conditions, which will include warm temperatures but better overnight recovery," she said.

A fire ban is in place for the protection area, which includes most of northern Alberta and foothills regions alongside the Rocky Mountains.