‘No primary residences lost’ in all-day battle with fire, village says

An all-night battle to stop wildfire FS016 from reaching Fort Simpson homes ended with none being lost, the village incident command said on Saturday morning.

“No primary residences were lost. The damage assessment is still under way, and more structures could be lost in the coming days. We will be contacting those affected as the situation progresses,” the village stated just before 10am.

Some firefighters worked through the night to extinguish spot fires and defend homes, the village stated. “Their structural protection equipment, tenacity, and quick thinking prevented the situation from becoming a catastrophe.”

However, officials cautioned the fire will remain active within neighbourhoods on Saturday, requiring another hard day of work. NWT Fire stressed the danger had not passed and “challenging conditions” continue, with the wind now shifting to come from the north.

“The challenge today is there is active fire in the residential areas. It was spotting across the road and obviously anywhere where there’s standing timber, it is burning in those areas,” fire information officer Forrest Tower told Cabin Radio at 10am.

Crews “were dealing with stuff all night and they’re probably going to continue to deal with stuff today, in terms of spot fires that might threaten to grow today,” Tower said.

“We have a wind shift as well, so winds will be coming from the north today. A lot of what were flanks, so the sides of the fire, they’re going to be the head of the fire now, so the threat is not gone. We got quite lucky with a lot of hard work last night, not losing any residential structures that we know of yet, but today definitely is going to be challenging for fire responders in that area.”

The village said the fire “is now widespread along the eastern side of Highway 1 and is expected to push to the airport. Yesterday’s successes are to be celebrated but we are not out of the woods yet.”

‘Not suggesting a pristine neighbourhood’

Tower told Cabin Radio that while no homes had been reported lost, some will have damage.

“There’s definitely going to be some damage to some of the structures, in terms of just smoke and radiant heat,” he said.

“I’m not suggesting that you’re going to come back to a pristine neighbourhood but, in terms of standing houses, we’re not aware of any losses there. That’s as good news as we could possibly hope for, based on how active that fire was when it burned across Highway 1.”

NWT Fire said some outbuildings are reported to have burned, even as homes were saved.

Friday’s extreme fire weather brought FS016 across Highway 1 toward residential areas south of Fort Simpson’s main village – and even started a spot fire that was rapidly addressed on the village island itself.

Only on Saturday morning could firefighters begin a meaningful assessment of how successful their efforts had been.

For evacuees watching from afar, the news that homes appeared largely intact was a relief.

“There it is, all our hard work over 35 years still there,” said Troy Bradbury, who lives in the Wild Rose subdivision, sharing a photo of his home sent to him by Dehcho Grand Chief Herb Norwegian.

“Our homes mostly wouldn’t be there without the crews who fought the fires.”

Saturday in Fort Simpson has a forecast high of 20C – cooler than FS016’s most extreme days – with some showers possible.

By the afternoon, the wind is expected to come from the northwest at 20 km/h gusting to 40 km/h, pushing the fire broadly from north to south as opposed to Friday’s west to east.