Campaign raises $91K for hurt, fallen first responders
Online campaigns have raised $91,000 for first responders affected by grass fires
Fundraising continues for those affected by wild grass fires that devastated parts of southwestern Saskatchewan earlier this week.
An online campaign set up to support the families of Ron Wedrick and his son, Evan, had raised close to $60,000 by Thursday afternoon.
The father and son, according to the online fundraising campaign, had been fighting the fires but were airlifted to Calgary because of severe burns and smoke inhalation. Ron is currently in stable condition, but Evan’s condition is critical.
Funds raised are expected to help the families of the two men travel to and stay in Calgary.
There is also an online campaign that has raised $31,000 of its $50,000 goal to support the family of James Hargrave. He was a volunteer firefighter from Alberta who died near Burstall while driving a water tanker.
Premier Brad Wall offered his condolences to the Hargrave family on Thursday.
“By every account he was just a very generous young man and rancher, and the loss will be great in his community and obviously to his family,” said Wall, who later added, “we’re grateful to all those who volunteered.”
The scope of the grass fires became clearer on Thursday, with the province announcing 30,000 hectares near Burstall and 4,000 hectares near Tompkins had been hit by the flames.
Duane McKay, the commissioner and executive director for Saskatchewan’s emergency management and fire safety branch, said the “impacts have been quite significant” and structures, livestock and feedstock were destroyed in the fire.
He said that damage will be further assessed in the coming days.
A total audit, according to the province, will be conducted on the emergency service response to the fires. While many are praising the work of first responders, some in the affected areas raised concern with the province’s response.
McKay said it is up to local municipalities to send out specific alerts — like evacuation orders — to communities. He said he recognized that in a rapidly moving situation like the one this week doing so “was probably a bit of a burden on local officials” and the process would be evaluated.
Some ranchers with land on the Alberta and Saskatchewan sides of the border, as well as residents in affected communities, raised concerns with how updates about the fire were sent out.
Saskatchewan uses a mobile app — SaskAlerts — to notify residents of ongoing situations like this week’s fires. McKay said that is the primary tool used by the government to notify people of developments, but that “the fail-safe here is the knock on the door.”
According to the province, 50 firefighting units were involved fighting the fires and, at peak time, there were over 1,100 phone calls made to 9-1-1 services.
A provincial fire ban has been put in place, and SaskPower is working to restore service for roughly 600 customers.
Although numbers are still being confirmed, approximately 400 livestock were left dead by the fire or had to be euthanized afterward.
There are no firm numbers yet on how many structures were lost as a result of the fires.
Twenty-seven people were evacuated from health care facilities in Leader because of the fire, but they returned on Thursday.