It's the largest fire evacuation in Alberta history

May 3, 2016 8:44 PM

Fort McMurray, a city of more than 80,000, has been ordered to evacuate after a massive wildfire breached the city limits today. The city wide evacuation order advised remaining residents to evacuate north to Noralta Lodge with the work camps that service the oil sands being pressed into service to house the evacuees. Earlier evacuations to the south producing some harrowing footage. Highway 63 has been closed south of the city, cutting off the main road connection between Ft. McMurray and the rest of Alberta.
posted by selenized (96 comments total)

This is terrible.

I used to think we didn't have any natural disasters here in Northern Canada.
posted by ODiV at 8:48 PM on May 3, 2016

Picture, don't have a source yet, sorry.
posted by ODiV at 8:52 PM on May 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

According to Alberta 511, southbound traffic has reopened on highway 63. Northbound traffic (i.e. into Ft. Mac) is obviously still closed.
posted by selenized at 8:54 PM on May 3, 2016

It has been stunningly dry and hot across the province this spring. I figured this would be a bad wildfire year, but this is horrid.

Best wishes to the folks of Ft. McMurray tonight.
posted by nubs at 8:54 PM on May 3, 2016

CBC has a liveblog.

Twitter hashtag #ymmfire
posted by nubs at 8:58 PM on May 3, 2016

Listening to CBC radio coverage this afternoon has been terrifying. The emergency broadcast voice kept breaking in, with a grimly narrowing list of evacuation routes.

CBC will be pre-empting normal programming all night, because they're the only radio broadcaster still operating with coverage of the area. You should be able to stream Radio One live here.
posted by figurant at 8:59 PM on May 3, 2016

This is awful.
posted by rtha at 9:03 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oh my lord, that's terrible. I hope everyone gets out safely.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 9:04 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Stay safe Albertans!!!
The "harrowing footage" footage tweet is full of responses from reporters trying to interview the person and then some people telling them to leave the poster.
It is indeed harrowing to watch.
posted by chapps at 9:04 PM on May 3, 2016

Had a fun half-hour this afternoon trying to get news about my cousin, who lives in Ft. Mac, until her sister let us know that she was out of town on vacation. Whew. So now we're hoping her friends are OK and that she still has a home to come back to.
posted by rewil at 9:07 PM on May 3, 2016

Holy crap, this is Australian firestorm level bad. Not something you expect in northern Canada. I'm sure we can expect many more like this as the climate changes.
posted by chimaera at 9:10 PM on May 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

according the Guardian, "No injuries so far," which may be old news but it points to this thing not being catastrophic in terms of loss of life, which is good. But having seen what my sister and family went through a few years back when they lost their home in a fire, my heart goes out.
posted by philip-random at 9:11 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Gosh; this is terrible. If you aren't familiar with Alberta, it might give perspective to know that Fort Mac is over 400 km (250 miles) from Edmonton, the nearest city, with the first 300 km of that before even hitting "large" towns of fewer than 5000 people like Athabasca or Lac La Biche. There's essentially nothing there outside of the townsite, the oilsands plants and the temporary camps for the workers, and by nothing I don't mean "only small villages" or "random farms", I mean trees. It's got a massive migrant oil worker population; nobody knows for sure how many people even live there - the official city is 60K, but between motel rooms, work camps and so on, there could be 130K in the greater region.

Here's hoping everybody gets out safely.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 9:12 PM on May 3, 2016 [34 favorites]

Estimates of displaced people from officials speaking now:

17,000 heading North
8,000 sent to Anzac Rec Centre
9,000 heading towards Lac La Biche
18,000 heading south towards Edmonton

Estimates based on vehicle counts by emergency services.
posted by figurant at 9:20 PM on May 3, 2016 [4 favorites]

I missed this post before I put mine up. I'll move my info here and ask the mods to delete my FPP.

Canadian fire risk map; look at all the red in Alberta and Saskatchewan. There are likely to be more fires this summer than in previous summers, just like most summers, probably because of climate change:

Flannigan calculates the average amount of land reduced to ash by wildfire in Alberta annually has doubled since the 1970s. ... It’s a change he attributes to climate change, and while he points to unusual factors like El Nino fanning the flames this year, he said the general trend seems to be towards more serious fire seasons.

Last year, NASA took some striking pictures from space of wildfires in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Last week, a 19-year-old volunteer firefighter was arrested for arson after one of the world's largest wooden trestle bridges went up in flames near Mayerthorpe, Alberta, a five-hour drive from this week's fire in Fort McMurray.

There have been 311 wildfires so far this year in Alberta, 31 of which are still burning, and 3 of which are listed as out of control.

Tomorrow, the wind in Fort McMurray is expected to be gusting from 25 to 30 km/h. Global News also has coverage.
posted by clawsoon at 9:20 PM on May 3, 2016 [15 favorites]

I've a friend from Fort Mac; does anyone know if Canada has an inciweb equivalent?
posted by faineant at 9:32 PM on May 3, 2016

Clawsoon, those are just horrible predictions.

Weather is saying it's been 11 degrees hotter than normal on average here already this year.
This is going to hurt.
posted by BlueHorse at 9:38 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

faineant: The Canadian Wildland Fire Information System is roughly equivalent (clawsoon linked to its map above).
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:40 PM on May 3, 2016

faineant: related, if you want to track the status of the emergency in terms of evacuation orders and such, Alberta Emergency Alert is the place to go. The alert for Ft McMurray will be maintained with official updates until the emergency is over.
posted by selenized at 9:44 PM on May 3, 2016

Thank you very much, mandolin conspiracy and selenized; my apologies for missing the link clawsoon.
posted by faineant at 9:49 PM on May 3, 2016

Should Twitter user Tyler be paid for the use of his footage? Amazing that Robyn Doolittle was the first person to ask for permission to use it.
posted by My Dad at 9:49 PM on May 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

For those trying to check in on friends, Facebook has activated the Safety Check feature for Fort McMurray.
posted by karayel at 9:50 PM on May 3, 2016

Seeing reports now on Twitter that the fire has reached downtown Ft. Mac and that the hospital is also on fire.

So far, the only reported injury I've seen is a sprained ankle, which is frankly utterly amazing.
posted by nubs at 9:52 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

holy shit this is scary as hell. those poor people. i am basically speechless.
posted by futz at 9:53 PM on May 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

Geeze. I've been watching this on twitter a little as I edited a paper this afternoon. Really hope the government figures out what to do with all those people. I don't know if Canada has had an evacuation of this scale in modern times. I'm really worried about the people evacuating north; I can't see many (really any) ways back south again, except by that road which sounds like it is going to get cut off. There looks like there MIGHT be logging roads heading each from Fort McKay, but google doesn't even mark them.
posted by Canageek at 9:54 PM on May 3, 2016

I saw some of the footage earlier, dashcam of people driving down the highway with flames on one side and so much smoke everywhere you could barely see. It was horrifying. I hope everyone gets out safely--I'm worried about what happened to the hospital especially.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:55 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Wow, I had no idea! Sounds like a lot of refugees are headed here.
posted by Kevin Street at 9:58 PM on May 3, 2016

Meanwhile, about two weeks ago ....

Alberta Premier Rachel Notley defends cut in wildfire budget

With dry conditions and dozens of blazes already burning across Alberta, Premier Rachel Notley said Tuesday her government’s decision to slash the wildfire budget by $15 million this year won’t impact the province’s firefighting efforts.
posted by philip-random at 9:59 PM on May 3, 2016 [15 favorites]

Many of the camps have their own air strips, so conceivably they could start evacuating people out slowly by plane. But yeah, as it stands the only real way out is back down highway 63.

As for the potentially 18,000 people headed for Edmonton. I don't know where we are going put all those people. I hope the city has a plan.
posted by selenized at 9:59 PM on May 3, 2016

Rexall Place seems the obvious choice, probably with support from the Forces and Red Cross.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:01 PM on May 3, 2016

It says in the Journal that the Catholic School Board has offered to open up all their gyms as evacuation centres. That should help a bit.
posted by Kevin Street at 10:01 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

fffm re the hospital, from cbc twitter:

CBC Calgary Verified account
‏@CBCCalgary

Hospital evacuation in #ymm a success, says @AHS_media. Family can call Health Link (811) to find out about their loved ones. #ymmfire

posted by chapps at 10:03 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Sister is an emt in Edmonton, worried about the work tonight, and her wife is in Quebec as part of the army, wondering if she will be called back. One friend was thinking about going back up to the camps, glad shes back.

I don't think I can explain to people outside of Alberta how ingrained this knowledge and fear of the prairies going up in flames is, and how it has been for 200 years.

Growing up in Edmonton, there was a large 19th century oil painting in the foyer of the Art Gallery of Alberta, of a bison herd fleeing a praarie fire, that seemed to be the way that Edmonton wanted to see each other for a long time.

My mom lost her first house to fire in Central Alberta, when she was 6, almost lost her brother. Every Albertan has a dozen stories like this.

I'm in Hamilton now, but I'm worried.
posted by PinkMoose at 10:09 PM on May 3, 2016 [18 favorites]

selenized, in a previous job I had peripheral involvement with emergency management in Calgary and I was engaged in some of the stuff during the flood in 2013. Based on that, I would say that right now Edmonton is opening up multiple reception centres, where people can check in so that there starts to be some degree of understanding who is in the city and to provide central contact points for information and services. Then, the reception centres will either be farming people out to hotels/motels under some pre-arranged deals, or the reception centres themselves (often rec centres/community centres) will be temporary places for people to stay. But most municipal emergency management plans are good for about 72 hours, and this is going to swamp that.

18,000 is a big number, and by tomorrow Edmonton will likely be looking for spaces in other cities, and the province will likely start to set up some "temporary towns" (ask some High River folks how temporary those are). Fort Mac evacuees are going to wind up all over the province before this is over, because there are thousands more beyond what is now flowing to Edmonton. I know the Calgary Emergency Management response has already started gearing up, because you can't displace this many people and expect any one city to absorb it when the displacement is going to be on the order of weeks/months. We're all going to be part of responding to this.
posted by nubs at 10:13 PM on May 3, 2016 [6 favorites]

Canageek: I don't know if Canada has had an evacuation of this scale in modern times.

There was the Slave Lake fire evacuation of 7,000 people in 2011, and the Calgary flood evacuation of 75,000-100,000 people in 2013.

PinkMoose: My mom lost her first house to fire in Central Alberta, when she was 6, almost lost her brother. Every Albertan has a dozen stories like this.

One of my earliest memories is of a fire sweeping across the valley, missing a couple of homes in our little hamlet by tens of meters. Later, in my teens, helping put a fire out on the other side of the valley where someone had decided to burn off a bit of grass and it got a bit - thankfully not a lot - bigger than they had expected.

And, of course, having my parents freak out on me when they found the box of matches I was keeping in my sock drawer... because fire is fun and interesting, right??
posted by clawsoon at 10:17 PM on May 3, 2016

Seeing reports now on Twitter that the fire has reached downtown Ft. Mac and that the hospital is also on fire.

If true, my god.
posted by jokeefe at 10:18 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

clawsoon: Ok, so this is going to be about the same scale as 2013 by the time it is over I bet, given the current population of Fort Mac. Did that one go decently?
posted by Canageek at 10:19 PM on May 3, 2016

As nubs said, this is going to be a long term problem. It's unclear right now just how much of Fort McMurray is on fire, but it sounds pretty bad. Hopefully these people will be able to go back to their homes when it's all over, but for quite a few people that might not be an option.
posted by Kevin Street at 10:22 PM on May 3, 2016

Ugh, those videos are terrifying. Having been in a few fires its so understandable how it's far away and not a problem until suddenly it's not so far and its a big problem. Still, you tend to think you are safe in town.

Being caught in a huge evac like that is my nightmare. I think it's incredible an entire city full of people plus a hospital evacuated over a few hours via two roads through those hellish conditions, everyone got out and one sprained ankle is the extent of the reported injuries. I'm really not sure my city could pull that off. I'm not sure the people here could be as steadfast and orderly as the people driving through an inferno. We can't even maintain a good following distance and keep our lights on on a normal day.
posted by fshgrl at 10:23 PM on May 3, 2016 [4 favorites]

the Calgary flood evacuation of 75,000-100,000 people in 2013.

The initial flood evacuation in Calgary was about 75,000 people...but within about 48 hours, a pretty significant number of those were able to go home because the waters had crested, and their homes hadn't been impacted or the damage wasn't severe enough to prevent habitation during clean-up and remediation. And for many during that period, they had friends/family willing to give a spare room or a couch. In this scenario, there may not be much of Fort Mac to go back to for a while, so this is a big number that is going to need support & housing for a while. Beyond homes, they've lost jobs today too.
posted by nubs at 10:25 PM on May 3, 2016 [4 favorites]

This is horrible. I hope everyone makes it out safe.
posted by humanfont at 10:27 PM on May 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

Canageek: Ok, so this is going to be about the same scale as 2013 by the time it is over I bet, given the current population of Fort Mac. Did that one go decently?

I can't give a great answer (hopefully someone else will chip in), but this one has the character of Slave Lake (entire remote town destroyed by fire) with the scale of Calgary (60,000+).

On preview, what nubs said.

I don't doubt that they'll get everyone out safely (Lord willing and the creek do rise, I hope), but the much smaller town of Slave Lake took a couple of years and a couple of hundred million dollars to rebuild. (And I don't think it's completely back on its feet yet.) Fort Mac is about ten times that size and two or three times farther from a major center. If oil prices go up, though, rebuilt it will be...
posted by clawsoon at 10:30 PM on May 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

Re the hospital... Just to be clear it was evacuated successfully; if on fire, it's empty. Still a tragic loss.
posted by chapps at 11:19 PM on May 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

Oh my god. I've been listening to the news about this all day but that's the first footage I've seen. It's apocalyptic. I hope very much there's no loss of life. Those poor people, my god.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 1:35 AM on May 4, 2016 [2 favorites]

This is terrible to read about.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:47 AM on May 4, 2016

It just feels SO EARLY for a fire like this. Truly a terrible event. I hope for safety and sanity for everyone concerned. I ran into an inconsequential wildfire with wallabear on our way back to eastern WA from Portland, and it was scary enough just being burning fields. We turned around and took an alternate route and marveled at the amount of smoke we were seeing as we rounded the fire back to our original route.

I can't possibly imagine what it would mean to see Where You Live being consumed like this.
posted by hippybear at 2:06 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

The reports of gridlock on the highway for people trying to evacuate last night were absolutely horrifying. One of my aunts posted a couple of pics on facebook and it really looked like a scene from a big budget disaster movie. Apparently a gas station in the Beacon Hill area exploded last night, and conditions aren't expected to help firefighters any today. So scary.
posted by peppermind at 3:35 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

So as of 4 AM, the severe losses are in three communities - Abasand, Beacon Hill and Waterways. These constitute a relatively small share of the housing stock, but the bad news is these are all adjacent to the downtown. The first two are west of highway 63 and south of the Athabasca River, the third is east of the highway and immediately south of the gridded downtown area.

Most of the housing is in the Thickwood and Timberlea communities north of the river, where there have - so far - been few losses, while the downtown is home to a lot of institutions, such as the hospital, the college and the mall, and only one home has been lost there so far.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 4:22 AM on May 4, 2016 [2 favorites]

Wildfire Update - May 4, 4 a.m. Residential damage assessment (approximate) from the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, the municipal government for the Fort McMurray region.
posted by grouse at 4:48 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't know if Canada has had an evacuation of this scale in modern times.

I was part of the Mississauga Train Derailment evacuation of 200,000 people. Canada can handle this. People and the community come together. My biggest memory was free McDonald's Cheeseburgers and people dancing around a boombox in Toronto's International Center where we camped in a corner with our sleeping bags and few changes of clothing while chlorine gas floated around the center of our city.
posted by srboisvert at 5:07 AM on May 4, 2016 [9 favorites]

For those who'd like to help, the Canadian Red Cross is doing an appeal specifically for this event.

I know that the Red Cross has a dubious reputation in some countries, but the Canadian one is well regarded generally.
posted by peppermind at 5:17 AM on May 4, 2016 [5 favorites]

Thanks, peppermind --- I was looking for something like that.

And from the fire risk map faienant posted, it looks like it's going to be a long, scary summer for pretty much all of both Alberta and Saskatchewan --- stay safe, y'all.
posted by easily confused at 5:34 AM on May 4, 2016

I'm a New Brunswicker, so I and almost everyone I know knows someone who's up there working in the oil fields.

The only reason my cousin is not there now was that he flew back home due to the failing health of our grandfather. I can't imagine how he must feel right now.

I hope people manage to evacuate safely. I will donate what I can.
posted by one of these days at 5:48 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

Fighting massive wildfires like this is child's play compared to fighting structural fires (which I've done). It's hard to imagine how dangerous it is but think of it as the closest human beings will come to battling monsters.
posted by tommasz at 5:55 AM on May 4, 2016

This is awful; I have friends who live in Alberta, although not the area affected by these fires. Here's hoping everyone gets out safely.

I can be kind of fatalistic, and these days every time I go camping here in Ontario part of me wonders how long it will be before a combination of invasive insects and wildfires exacerbated by climate change destroy the beautiful forests we take for granted here.
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:26 AM on May 4, 2016

In the Reddit thread, there's one or two folks who were evacuated by Shell and other big operators in the area. (Lots of scary-ass photos linked there, too. Yikes!)

I am happy to hate on oil companies, but they are taking care of their people -- and also non-employees, too, from the firsthand accounts.

Take care, America's Hat; I hope the rains come today.
posted by wenestvedt at 7:23 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

Two of my cousins have lost there homes so far though I haven't heard where they are now. It's likely several other family members will join them which is one of the really bitches about this fire. IE: when one person's house burns down they'll hopefully have people around to help out. When every homeowner in an extended family has their house burn down there isn't any family support available and everyone needs help.
posted by Mitheral at 7:29 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

The feeding frenzy of journalists looking to get a scoop from people who are clearly fleeing for their lives in their pictures and videos is one of the many ugly things about social media.
posted by Karaage at 8:18 AM on May 4, 2016 [10 favorites]

philip-random: total red herring. This is just moving money from one column to another. No fires are being not fought because of the budget.

Karaage: Also, the journalists who already patted themselves on the back for being so "intrepid". Really? A few of them are wasting no time at all making the story about themselves.
posted by Kurichina at 8:48 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

My partner's company runs several of the work camps being used as evacuation centres. Rooms designed for one person are now housing whole families with pets and many more are sleeping in their cars in the parking lot. They were only at partial capacity before due to the recession, but all available space is filled now.
posted by Kurichina at 8:52 AM on May 4, 2016 [3 favorites]

.
posted by Bighappyfunhouse at 8:55 AM on May 4, 2016

My cousin is there flying one of the fire bombers. Hard not to be nervous when he is posting how scary it is. He's not one to say that unless it's really bad. The pictures are horrifying.
posted by Jalliah at 8:56 AM on May 4, 2016 [5 favorites]

Looking at the CBC live blog:

Sounds like overnight the fire crews put out every structure fire in the town site. Conditions today expected to be worse than yesterday. Fire expected to continue to be a threat to the city and remaining structures. Focus on preserving life and critical infrastructure. Sounds like they are still finding stragglers who haven't left.

Fire exceeds 10000 hectares.

Firefighting crews and equipment from other cities arriving today.
posted by nubs at 9:26 AM on May 4, 2016

My niece most likely lost her home yesterday. She lived on Beacon Hill Dr., which looks like it forms the perimeter of the neighbourhood that is now 80% destroyed. She has a two year old and is expecting her second child any day now. They relocated to a place south of Fort McMurray yesterday, hear that they're driving to Edmonton this morning. Difficult to imagine what it will be like to have a child at the same time that your entire foundation has been removed, with no place to take the baby home to. Both her and her husband work well-paying jobs at the oil plants, they're going in an afternoon from comfortable affluence, lots of toys, to not having a bowl and a spoon of their own. She has family in Ontario, his are in Saskatchewan. I wonder where she'll be able to go to settle herself with a newborn and a toddler.

Such amazing luck if no one is killed, when gas stations are exploding and flames are jumping the only road out of town. How close did they come to the whole town being trapped? In addition to all the residents there who have a couple huge trucks to drive out of town, there must be a considerable transient population. Those who perform the service jobs, workers who fly in and take buses to the job sites, those who hoped to find a future in a boom town. Their numbers have probably lessened considerably with the economic downturn, but that population would still have some presence. How do they leave quickly? Until recently when she took her maternity leave, my niece had a nanny from the Philippines living with her family. There must be many nannies around town, in an expensive affluent place where both adults in the family work good paying jobs. So you all evacuate quickly and then learn you have no place for your family to return and you don't know what you'll next. What then happens to the nanny?
posted by TimTypeZed at 9:27 AM on May 4, 2016 [3 favorites]

Here's some footage from CBC this morning of some of the destruction.
posted by ODiV at 10:00 AM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

i've been following this on kate beaton's twitter and the videos she's posting are fucking harrowing.
posted by poffin boffin at 10:01 AM on May 4, 2016 [3 favorites]

TimTypeZed: Both her and her husband work well-paying jobs at the oil plants, they're going in an afternoon from comfortable affluence, lots of toys, to not having a bowl and a spoon of their own.

I say this in all seriousness: I hope that the time is not too far off when they have recovered enough, and healed enough, to maybe call the little one Sparky.

Disasters of this scale -- like Katrina, like that tornado that hit during prom and wiped out a town -- must leave emotional scars for life. I can't imagine what each individual's recovery will take, so I wish them well and hope their spirits rise again.

As a little kid I sat through the brief, informational movie at the Hinckley Fire Museum, and the footage of fire, coupled with the narration, scared the shit out of me and still disturbs me. God bless those poor people.
posted by wenestvedt at 12:11 PM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

Completely terrifying time-lapse shot by a reporter as he was fleeing.
posted by rtha at 12:27 PM on May 4, 2016 [1 favorite]

> The feeding frenzy of journalists looking to get a scoop from people who are clearly fleeing for their lives in their pictures and videos is one of the many ugly things about social media.

Yeah, and what's the "scoop"? "Fire Is Big, People Who Are Fleeing It Are Scared And Upset"?
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:23 PM on May 4, 2016

@Kurichina - thanks for that info re: the work camps. CBC news said about 10,000 people fled north to the camps for shelter, and the number was kind of staggering; the size of a group of that many people able to relocated and accommodated! It's easier to think of how it works now.

My heart goes out to Ft. Mac - I'm no fan of the tar sands but this is just terrible, so many people losing so much.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 3:06 PM on May 4, 2016

Some notes from a briefing about half-an-hour/fourty-five minutes ago:

-provincial state of emergency declared
-two more evacuation centers opened
-no reports of anyone missing
-no reports of anyone left in town
-downtown Ft. McMurray being held against the fire
posted by nubs at 3:19 PM on May 4, 2016

There is also now an evacuation order for the hamlet of Glenevis on the Alexis First Nation, which is about 90km NW of Edmonton due to wildfires.
posted by nubs at 3:28 PM on May 4, 2016

A fatal crash on Highway 881, which is congested with evacuees, has sparked another small fire.
posted by rewil at 3:52 PM on May 4, 2016

Be safe Canadian friends.
posted by Divine_Wino at 4:36 PM on May 4, 2016

Parts of the Town of High Level now under mandatory evacuation due to wildfires.
posted by nubs at 5:49 PM on May 4, 2016

There are still 70km/h+ winds happening as well. Not good.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 6:00 PM on May 4, 2016

The fires up there are of a size that means they are capable of producing their own wind, according to the news last night. The bright spot, if there is one, is that it should cool off tomorrow.
posted by nubs at 6:04 PM on May 4, 2016

The 5:50 PM PST view from the Fort McMurray airport.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 6:15 PM on May 4, 2016

Even if one feels a little schadenfreude at the oils sands project running into a problem exasperated by global warming people should be aware oil workers aren't the only reason Fort Mac exists. My family has been there since before Columbus suckered Spain into paying for his wild goose chase.
posted by Mitheral at 6:19 PM on May 4, 2016 [15 favorites]

People who fled Fort McMurray wildfire now evacuated from Anzac after blaze moves south.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:06 PM on May 4, 2016

Even if one feels a little schadenfreude at the oils sands project running into a problem exasperated by global warming people should be aware

my Facebook is currently somewhat of a clusterf*** due to various friends (and friends-of-friends) insistence on making it all-about-global-warming, which just isn't playing well with folks (other friends and friends-of-friends) who currently find themselves in the middle of the emergency.

I'm not saying it isn't completely concerned with global warming (my unscientific impression is that it probably is), but holy shit, lecturing Alberta about climate issues while a big fire is still out of control and destroying one of its towns is akin to lecturing a parent about (relevant safety precaution) while one of their children is still in the emergency room. Really bad timing. So much so that any positive point that could be made won't just get ignored in the heat of the moment, it will get antagonized against ... out of righteous bloody anger (certainly by some).
posted by philip-random at 8:33 AM on May 5, 2016 [5 favorites]

Starting a larger conversation from a tragedy shouldn't be out of bounds (see mass shootings), but yeah it's shitty to go after the people whose homes are on fire, suggesting karmic justice or some shit. It's not like Albertans are the ones using all of that oil. I mean, I'm definitely using more than my fair share.
posted by ODiV at 8:42 AM on May 5, 2016 [1 favorite]

I am amazed that so far no one is reported to have been killed by this fire. This is certainly a testament to the calibre of emergency preparedness and the work of the first responders.
posted by [expletive deleted] at 10:25 AM on May 5, 2016 [3 favorites]

I heard, through twitter so spice as necessary, that this may be more a function of forest management practices than anything. The remarkable warm weather and mild winter didn't help, of course, but the boreal forest burns as part of its lifecycle, preventing it just makes the fire (when it does happen) all the bigger. Which is the problem with blaming natural disasters on global warming, it is very hard to disentangle all the causes are with any particular disaster. There are good ways of having a conversation on climate change but harping at people who just lost their homes is not one of them.

Has anyone else watched the Premier's morning news conferences? One part I found sort of messed up were the questions about how much this is going to cost, and how much lost production is expected. Not that journalists shouldn't be asking questions or doing their jobs, but it just seemed so heartless.
posted by selenized at 11:37 AM on May 5, 2016 [4 favorites]

Part of it is modern forest mangement, and part of it is building a city where a city probably shouldn't be. Fires happen in the boreal forest, now more than ever, and when city and forest are practically contiguous there will always be a danger. But that's not really relevant now, since Fort McMurray has been big for a long time. It's simply a reality that thousands of people live next to the forest, and when this is over some kind of prevention system will have to be figured out so it doesn't happen again.
posted by Kevin Street at 2:07 PM on May 5, 2016

There are good ways of having a conversation on climate change but harping at people who just lost their homes is not one of them.

Yeah, I've been avoiding the Twitter hastags related to the fire for precisely that reason. Close to 90,000 people have had to flee their homes in terror, some with only seconds to spare.

Nobody asks to be on the receiving end of a natural disaster. I'm still amazed that the only deaths so far have been traffic fatalities. A lot of that credit certainly goes to the authorities, but I'd guess that it also means people were being good and kind to their neighbours or even strangers to help them get out.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 3:39 PM on May 5, 2016 [1 favorite]

One of the more interesting things about the evacuation is how diverse the population seems to be in Fort McMurray. There is a range of cultures and ethnicities. It's like Fort Mac is the quintessential Canadian city.
posted by My Dad at 4:44 PM on May 5, 2016 [1 favorite]

"It has begun to create its own weather, even creating its own high winds yesterday, and even lightning was coming from the smoke clouds."
posted by oulipian at 6:28 PM on May 5, 2016 [3 favorites]

The phenomenon has a name: pyrocumulus clouds. A unique sort of horrible in low-humidity forest fire conditions.
posted by figurant at 8:25 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]

Raw footage of aftermath

Fort McMurray and the Fires of Climate Change
posted by gwint at 7:32 AM on May 6, 2016 [1 favorite]

Fort McMurray fire now too large, too fierce to stop without rain

“Let me be clear: air tankers are not going to stop this fire,” Chad Morrison of Alberta Forestry said at a briefing in Edmonton. “(The fire) is going to continue to push through these dry conditions until we actually get some significant rain.”

The forecast is not promising: several more days of sunshine, warm temperatures and flame-fanning breezes are expected for northeastern Alberta.

posted by Kevin Street at 1:08 PM on May 6, 2016

Yesterday, I was driving around town (Calgary) and noticed that the City's variable message signs were, instead of giving traffic information, displaying:

WELCOME 
NORTHERN 
EVACUEES

OUR HOME 
IS YOUR
HOME 

Which made me pretty happy with whoever came up with that idea.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 5:36 AM on May 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

From CBC journalist Rosemary Barton:

Notley: 2400 structures lost, 25-thousand saved. Lost about 10% of the city. Hospitals and schools are all standing. #hw

posted by grouse at 2:41 PM on May 9, 2016

CBC Radio had an hour-long-ish interview with three firefighters this morning. They talked about how homes that weren't on fire were knocked down to save neighbourhoods, saving terrified pets, a woman named Betty who made them sandwiches, and the sound of fire and explosions being so loud that they had to yell at each other to be heard even when they were inches away.
posted by clawsoon at 6:40 AM on May 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Smoke from the fires reached Edmonton today, 400 km south. There's a haze and you can smell it.
posted by figurant at 11:15 AM on May 12, 2016

I think Calgary is supposed to be in the smoke tomorrow. Today, we have some rain, for which I am very grateful as it has been bone dry down here too.

Wishing I could force the clouds to move north, though.
posted by nubs at 1:54 PM on May 12, 2016