Four homes have been lost in the evacuation zone, with Grande Prairie Regional Partnership Officials saying they are making progress when it comes to preventing more loss from the Dune West Wildfire. During Monday’s information session, County of Grande Prairie Regional Fire Chief Trevor Grant confirmed residents of the homes have been informed of the property loss.
During the information session, GPREP Incident Command Officer for the fire Dan Lemieux says as crews work to fight the fire the priorities are life safety first, incident stabilization second, and protection of properties and land third. Lemieux told those in attendance while crews continue to battle the blaze and work to protect the properties and homes, there is a group planning on doing a damage assessment.
“The response remains the priority, and the conditions are rapidly changing and we are adapting to that, so the damage assessment will be done as soon as conditions allow,” Lemieux says. “I want you to know we do have active fire fighting out there, but we have a team that is planning to go in and do a damage assessment as soon as it is safe for them to enter the area.”
He adds GPREP staff are also working on a re-entry plan for evacuees to return to their homes, as soon as it is safe to do so.
City of Grande Prairie Mayor Jackie Clayton was on hand during the information session Monday in a support role for not only evacuees but the city’s partners in GPREP. Clayton says many hands are needed to deal with this sort of emergency. Having been on city council during the High-Level fires in 2019 when evacuees came to Grande Prairie, Clayton says you forget about what emergencies are like until you are in them.
“You often look back on it as a memory, and then all of a sudden it is in your face – it all comes crashing back in the sense of the feeling for people, of what they are going through, it hurts your heart to see people suffering,” Clayton says. “This region is very interconnected, you know people that live in these regions. You know people they can be your friends or your family, they could be a loved one, what they are going through is extremely hard to sit and observe and really for us [the city] to provide support, as much support as possible is the goal with this.”
During the question period, a majority of the questions from evacuees were around communication and wondering what the timeline will look like to get back into their homes. Officials could not give an exact timeline, as the situation is continually evolving, with weather conditions playing a role.
During the public forum, Chief Grant shared there are 56 firefighters on 19 fire apparatuses on the ground fighting the fire and one air operations group which is supported by four helicopters. There are also two dozer groups with seven bulldozers, and an excavator creating a guard to create a border around the fire which at 7:00 p.m. Monday was 1,700 hectares in size.