‘It was hell. We lost everything. The NWT has to learn from it.’

Mike Couvrette and Helena Katz lost everything they held dear in a nightmare, trapped inside a wildfire on August 13, 2023. They want to be sure the public has a voice in reviewing what happened.

Couvrette and Katz are known for their Fort Smith alpaca farm, which they called “a bit of an anomaly in the midst of the vast wilderness of Canada’s northern boreal forest.”

When that forest caught fire last summer and Fort Smith was placed under an evacuation order, they fled from Fort Smith to the pastures of Paradise Gardens, south of Hay River, where their five alpacas could graze in safety, watched by their two livestock guard dogs.

However, Hay River issued its own evacuation order within hours of their arrival – and the highway outside Paradise Gardens was being consumed by wildfire by the time they could leave.

“It was hell,” said Couvrette, fighting back tears as he relived the journey in an interview.

“The truck was on fire, the trailer was on fire, basically the road was on fire.”

Couvrette and Katz were rescued by another fleeing resident with the bravery to pull over amid the chaos and destruction. Their animals were lost and they barely escaped the highway themselves.

Couvrette told Cabin Radio: “There needs to be the opportunity for people like myself to say: This is what we went through. Why did we go through that?

“Eighty percent of Enterprise was consumed. For people to learn from that experience, the public has to be able to engage and ask questions of those people that were making decisions that day.

“We’re not going to be able to change what happened. We’re not asking for people’s heads to be chopped off or anything like that. But those questions need to be asked and answered, to give us closure.”

Below, read and listen to Mike Couvrette’s account of what happened on August 13, 2023 and how that shapes the kind of inquiry or review he wants to see of the NWT’s most devastating wildfire season on record.

On Thursday this week, MLAs are set to debate and vote on a motion calling for a public inquiry. Premier RJ Simpson has said a full inquiry under the Public Inquiries Act would be too costly and unwieldy, and existing reviews – carried out by independent contractors – will be enough.

Other MLAs have said only a public inquiry can be fully independent.

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This is an edited transcript of an interview first aired on Afternoons at the Cabin in February 2024. You can listen to the original audio using the player below.

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We were evacuated first from Fort Smith on August 12. By the time I had everything ready – the trailer, the truck and everything – it was 7pm.

We didn’t want to be unloading animals and trying to set up pens at 2am in Hay River, so we headed out of Fort Smith at about 6am on August 13, the Sunday. By 12pm we were in Paradise Gardens, where we had been offered use of a pasture. As soon as the truck pulled in, half a dozen people stepped in to help us set up pens for our alpacas.

By 2pm on Sunday, we had finished all of that and got the animals settled in. Our two livestock guard dogs were resting, I was preparing to get a tent set up for the night.

A little after 3pm, the phone goes off with the evacuation order from the Town of Hay River. OK, I guess we’d better start thinking about heading out of here. By 5:45pm we had everything loaded back up.

I got to the bottom of the hill at Paradise Gardens – and flames are starting.

We could see the flames by that point. It was either stay there and get consumed by fire or try to make a run for it, so we tried to run for it, got out onto the highway and it was…

It was hell.

There was no visibility. It was pitch black, smoke all over the place, flying embers, debris, flames all around. We just couldn’t see the road. Next thing I know, one of my tires must’ve got into the gravel and we got sucked into the ditch.

I started looking around. The truck was on fire, the trailer was on fire, basically the road was on fire. We had to abandon the vehicle.

One truck drove by – I was really pissed about that – and then a lady by the name of Claudia stopped in the middle of the highway and said, “You have to get in right now, there’s no waiting.” All I had a chance to do was yell at Helena to get over here.

We spent 20 minutes in that vehicle. She hit the side of the road several times because basically, unless there was a set of tail lights for us to follow, you couldn’t see the road.

We got to Enterprise and that’s when reality set in. We had lost everything.

We’re still deciding whether we’re going to rebuild. It’s hard to go out every day and see an empty yard.

We’re still hoping the government might provide us a bit of assistance. We lost the truck, we lost our trailer – well, it wasn’t even my trailer, so I have to replace the trailer to a friend who was kind enough to lend it to me. The truck just had basic insurance on it because the only thing I used it for was hauling hay.

So far, none of the expenses that ITI offers to cover are expenses that we would normally incur running a farm. We put an application in to Maca back in September. The last I heard was just before Christmas, they said they were still working on a plan.

We just move on, day to day. We have to decide fairly soon if we’re going to try to rebuild this summer, because locating animals and making plans to move them up here is going to be time-consuming. How I actually do that, I’m not sure yet. It’s hard. But we’ll pull through.

‘People probably want to talk’

We want to see an inquiry – a public inquiry conducted by an independent third body. Whether it necessarily needs to be a full public inquiry under the Public Inquiries Act, where you have lawyers and everything else? I don’t know if we need to go that far.

I think there needs to be the opportunity for people like myself to say: This is what we went through. Why did we go through that?

We’re not looking for retribution, reprisal or punishment. Time is permanent, we cannot change anything that has happened. We have to learn from what has happened to make sure that in the future – there are going to be other instances like this, I think, in the future – this doesn’t happen to anybody else.

And there are other people. If you look, there were a dozen vehicles that had to be abandoned on that highway. There are other people that went through a very similar experience.

Mark Benoit drove us from Enterprise down to High Level and dropped us off at the hospital because Helena was having difficulties from all the smoke she had inhaled. There was a teenager in there who had some significant burns. There are people out there that probably want to talk about this.

Looking at the terms of reference for the ECC after-action review, I could see no specific thing saying to engage the public. They say, “Yes, we’re going to talk to the public about this.” It’s been six months and I have not been contacted by one person from ECC or Maca, or anybody, asking me: “What happened to you guys?”

We feel if the public, the government and all the other agencies that were involved are to learn anything from our loss – and the losses of, like, 80 percent of Enterprise was consumed – for people to learn from that experience, the public has to be able to engage and ask questions of those people that were making decisions that day.

We’re not going to be able to change what happened. We’re not asking for people’s heads to be chopped off or anything like that. But those questions need to be asked and answered, to give us closure.