[The_e_man]

This is intense. A forest fire has put our province in a state of emergency. For those that don't know, Fort McMurray is a small city in northern Alberta responsible for a lot of the oil & gas industry that keeps our economy alive.
People are driving through the fire to escape. Vehicles were left stuck on the highway with no fuel. Entire communities burned to the ground.

I know one chick that lives there and she's going to be staying at my place for a while until she can get her life figured out. It's absolutely crazy whats going on and in true Canadian fashion, people from all over the province are offering support.

[Buck Wild]

delete

[Laner]

Just a few years ago my cousin, who is a firefighter, was working in a hall in Slave Lake. When the town burned down, he lost his house. His wife and four kids were obviously fine, but he didn't get to see them until the next day after working for 36 hours straight.

Now he is up in Fort Mac volunteering to take on this fire. The Alberta NDP are actually celebrating this as karma for all the pollution it has created. No shit, cant make this up.



Notley is refusing to call in the "state of emergency" and just a few weeks ago accused the opposition of "fear mongering" when she was confronted about slashing the forest fire budget.

Alberta is going to revolt. I have never seen this province so pissed off before. This little city essentially kept the Canadian economy rolling for the last decade.

[R_Niko]

Jesus... there's gonna be backlash over that tweet. My heart goes out.

[Nemausus]

The images coming from Fort Mac are harrowing. The city has become an inferno. Everything is either an orange, firey tint or a hazy cloud of smoke.

Entire homes and neighbourhoods have been razed and things could still get worse.

Alberta is really being tested in every way imaginable. Can't seem to catch a break. Godspeed to all those affected.

[HectorLavoe]

Any word on the cause of the fires? The work of extremist environmentalists to destroy the Oil sands industry?

[The_e_man]

(05-05-2016 12:38 AM)HectorLavoe Wrote:  

Any word on the cause of the fires? The work of extremist environmentalists to destroy the Oil sands industry?

Not that I know of. Forest fires are generally a completely normal and natural thing. They get contained once they are deemed dangerous / a possible threat.
The problem here is there was literally the perfect storm. Barely any percipitation this winter, extremely dry weather the past little while, and then to really put the nail in the coffin, the area has had crazy strong gusts of winds that made like 90 degree changes in direction. Literally the perfect storm. As if the poor city hasn't had it bad enough. As you can imagine, the drop in oil prices has really hit Fort Mac quite hard. This is absolutely heartbreaking.

One thing to note: our stupid ass premier who is from the NDP party (Canada's left-wing socialist hippy party) has cut the firefighting bughet by $15 million dollars just shortly before all of this. I suppose that money is better spent building washroom facilities that homos with blue hair can use if they hide their cock between their legs well enough.

[Sean]

The only people in Canada who might revolt are Albertans and I have slim hope of that. Notley deserves it, though.

"Fear mongering" = "You're right but our ideology only lets us attack you not admit it."

[RexImperator]

I thought there would still be snow on the ground this time of year way up there.

[Gustavus Adolphus]

Anybody heard from DannyAlberta? Do we have other guys on the forum from there that can give us any info?

If you're reading this DA, let us know if you we can help out in any way. Godspeed.

[scotian]

Guys this is completely fucked, my Facebook has blown up as I have hundreds of friends, family and co-workers who were evacuated, one girl I went to high school with posted a photo of her and her husband's burnt down house that they paid $800,000 for a couple of years ago, others have posted cell phone videos of them driving through a raging inferno, its pretty scary stuff.

I'm waiting for my one friend to call me to pick him up at the Edmonton airport, the oil sands company he works for flew him on a private charter from the site. Its been pretty wild, I was driving back to Alberta on Wednesday and as I left my hotel in BC, I saw some news about wild fires in the Fort McMurray area but didn't think too much of it as they are completely normal up that way (I was there in 2011 when they had massive ones). I was chatting with a former co-worker who was on his way up to Fort Mac for his two week rotation, we've been chatting lately about me coming to work with him and were actively talking to the boss about me moving up there to live in the company condo come June. I kept driving then my buddy who I'm picking up soon texted me a photo from his front porch and said he's evacuating to his work camp north of the city. Then I got home to Edmonton, turned on the news and saw how fucked up it really is and its still going on.

Its been really emotional, normally I don't tear up too easy but between seeing the devastation and destruction on the news and talking to my friends who had to leave everything behind, its been pretty hard. I've been working up in Fort Mcmurray for almost seven years now and have lived in the city, some of the news reports show areas where I lived that are completely destroyed.

I have no idea if I'll be working up there in a month's time or not, the company condos and office may have burnt, I'm not sure whats going on with the oil sites but I heard that a few have shut down. Obviously the most important part is that no lives were lost in the fire, Fort Mac is a tough town with tough people and I'm sure that they'll really come together to rebuild, I will look into seeing what I can do to give back to that community because its given so much to me over the years.

[AnonymousBosch]

^ I understand the shock, mate - I've been a volunteer bush fire fighter. I've seen massive destruction first hand, but I've also repeatedly-seen that strong people in close knit communities deal with this kind of devastation and work together to rebuild.

New growth eventually bursts out of seemingly-scarred landscapes, land and human spirit alike.

Be strong Scotian, and remember: you will endure.

[Chargeshot]

Yeah its pretty crazy. I've got a friend who has been updating her facebook with updates as her and her family drive to escape the blaze. Not uncommon for people to have to drive through streets/highways covered in fire.

[RexImperator]

http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/how-b...rray-fire/

Article shows size of fire compared to other major cities.

[porscheguy]

Anyone know how it started and when?

[911]

Not sure, I guess it was started only a couple of days ago, but basically you have optimal conditions: warm weather, bone-dry vegetation and high winds. Those conditions are relatively rare in western Canada, but you get them every Fall in California during fire season when the Santa Ana winds blow. In those type of conditions, it doesn't take much to start a major fire, a cigarette butt could do it.

[spygoat]

Mine and my buddies house's are gone. I was farming in Saskatchewan at the time so was lucky not to be there. He lost his dog...was a hell of a good dog too, Moose was his name.

Not that good up here boys. Lots of sadness for a lot of good people, but we all tough. We'll make it.

[GlobalMan]

^Damn, sorry to hear that man. I hope things work out and you're able to recover from it as best as possible.

[porscheguy]

(05-06-2016 01:04 AM)spygoat Wrote:  

Mine and my buddies house's are gone. I was farming in Saskatchewan at the time so was lucky not to be there. He lost his dog...was a hell of a good dog too, Moose was his name.

Not that good up here boys. Lots of sadness for a lot of good people, but we all tough. We'll make it.

Are you insured? Or do the insurance companies try to chalk this up as an "Act of God?"

[Chargeshot]

(05-06-2016 02:17 AM)porscheguy Wrote:  

(05-06-2016 01:04 AM)spygoat Wrote:  

Mine and my buddies house's are gone. I was farming in Saskatchewan at the time so was lucky not to be there. He lost his dog...was a hell of a good dog too, Moose was his name.

Not that good up here boys. Lots of sadness for a lot of good people, but we all tough. We'll make it.

Are you insured? Or do the insurance companies try to chalk this up as an "Act of God?"

I have heard, though its not certain, that it is impossible to get fire insurance in that region.

[TravelerKai]

I have alot of respect for Fort McMurray folks from working in the oil and gas industry with them from time to time. Tough and hard working people. While this saddens me to read about this, I feel confident you guys will pull through it.

I will be praying for all of you.

[S_tourist]

My heart goes out to the people of Fort McMurray. The city gave me the head start I needed in life 9 years ago. I lived there for 3 years, I made a lot of friends there. I have a few old co-workers that lost there homes, I can't imagine what they must be going through. It just seems like one bad thing after another for the Mac these past few years.

[911]

Sorry about your loss Spygot, I'm sure you will make it back again, hang in there bro.

Since the area seems prone to fires, they should look into alternative fire-resistant housing like straw bale or rammed earth houses (it's counter-intuitive but straw bale houses are very fire proof).

Same type of problem in areas like the coastal Carolinas that get flooded every few decades, they can just build houses on stilts, or with waterproof ground floors. You have to design houses that are adapted to their environments.

[rottenapple]

How is the lodging industry in Alberta? If it is big and badly managed it can have a great impact on the frequency and strength of forest fires. I just started reading Jared Diamond´s book on the collapse of societies (Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed) and in the first chapter he discusses it in the case of Montana. Haven´t read all of it yet so won´t go into detail here, but perhaps others with knowledge on the subject can chime in.

[911]

You mean logging, not lodging, right?