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Flights on Tuesday and Wednesday this week will return Wekweètì residents home after a brief evacuation brought on by a nearby wildfire.
The NWT’s wildfire agency says the fire that triggered the evacuation of Wekweètì last week is now under control.
Residents were taken to Yellowknife by air on June 29 after a series of lightning-triggered wildfires, the nearest around two kilometres from homes in the community.
On Monday, the territorial government’s Department of Environment and Climate Change said the nearest wildfire, ZF009, “has been called under control as of today.”
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The fire remains two kilometres from the community, the department stated on Facebook, and has not grown for the past three days. Weekend rain helped.
The department said air tankers had worked to keep the fire from the community and control lines, scraped clear of vegetation, had been established east of Wekweètì to reduce the likelihood that the fire would spread.
Sprinklers will remain in place as a precaution, the department added.
Two other nearby fires, ZF007 and ZF008, are being monitored and are not currently considered a threat.
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A territorial government notice states that flights for returning evacuees will depart Yellowknife’s Air Tindi terminal at 4:30pm on Tuesday and 2pm on Wednesday.
Evacuees who don’t take those flights are told they will have to make arrangements at their own cost.
Wekweètì was the fourth NWT community to face a wildfire-related evacuation this summer, following Hay River, the Kátł’odeeche First Nation and Sambaa K’e.
Sambaa K’e’s residents also went home within the past week, following a significantly longer evacuation period.
