Police report ‘altercation outside bar’ in evacuated Yellowknife

If two people have a scrap outside a city bar while all 20,000 residents are supposed to be elsewhere, does anybody hear it?

Yes. The police do.

RCMP in Yellowknife said they were called to a “physical altercation … outside one of the bars that has remained open downtown” overnight between Friday and Saturday.

“RCMP attended and located two individuals with minor injuries,” a police press release issued on Saturday morning stated.

“No charges have been laid and no one involved in the incident was willing to provide a statement to police. As a result, no additional information on this incident is available.”

Multiple Yellowknife bars have chosen to stay open throughout the wildfire-related evacuation of the city, which began on August 16 and is now set to end on September 6.

Not everybody in the city left when asked. Reports suggest about 1,000 people refused to go.

Details of the altercation came in an overnight report that RCMP have provided daily since the evacuation began.

“The RCMP can also provide the daily reassurance that there continues to be no confirmed reports of break-and-enters,” that report stated.

“RCMP officers continue to patrol Yellowknife, Ndilǫ, Dettah and the Ingraham Trail.”