A catastrophic wildfire that has forced all
88,000 residents to flee Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada exploded
tenfold in size on Thursday, cutting off evacuees in camps and shelters
north of the city.
The out-of-control blaze has burned down
entire neighborhoods of Fort McMurray in Canada's energy heartland and
forced a precautionary shutdown of some oil production, driving up
global oil prices.
Three days after the residents were ordered to
leave Fort McMurray, firefighters were still battling to protect homes,
businesses and other structures from the flames. More than 1,600
structures, including hundreds of homes, have been destroyed.
Although the cause of the fire was unknown,
officials said tinder-dry brush, low humidity and hot, gusting winds
left crews unable to stop the massive conflagration.
The blaze, which erupted on Sunday, grew from
18,500 acres on Wednesday to some 210,000 acres Thursday, an area
roughly 10 times the size of Manhattan.
"What people in that region have gone through
in the last couple of days is literally hell on earth," Rona Ambrose,
leader of the opposition Conservative Party and an Albertan, fighting
back tears as she addressed the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa.
Fire has intermittently blocked the only route
south toward major cities, so thousands of evacuees fled north toward
oil camps and a few small settlements.
They found themselves stranded in makeshift
shelters and on roadsides when the flames cut them off from Fort
McMurray. Most of Alberta's oil sands facilities are north of the city
and not in the path of the flames.
A government airlift of evacuees began from
oil facility airstrips on Thursday. Canadian Natural Resources,
meanwhile, said it airlifted about 2,600 people over the last 24 hours
to Edmonton and Calgary, including its own workers, to make room for
more evacuees.
Frightened evacuees north of the city took to
Twitter, asking when they would be able to drive south and whether areas
to the north were safe.
"We're just sitting in a camp praying to get
out!! Give us answers!!! Please," Twitter user @jennimac780 told the
regional government.
"We haven't forgotten about you and you're safe," the government said on Twitter.
Hundreds filled a community center on Thursday
morning in Lac La Biche, a community about 170 miles (290 km) south of
Fort McMurray. Many were second-round evacuees who were ordered to
relocate from temporary refuges closer to Fort McMurray on Wednesday
night as the flames grew.
Other people bunked down in a Lac La Biche high school, its gym converted to a used-clothing station for the evacuees.
Kirby Abo, who came from Fort McMurray with
his wife and three children, said he worried that his job in a recycling
depot may no longer exist when he returns home.
"I think it's going to be a ghost town for quite a while," he said.
The winds gave the city a brief reprieve on
Thursday by driving the fire to the southeast, away from populated
areas. But officials warned that the unpredictable weather could quickly
shift again.
The winds pushed flames toward the local
airport, which suffered minor damage and was open for limited
non-commercial operations, officials said. A makeshift emergency
operations center at the airport was evacuated for the second time in
less than a day.
At least 640,000 barrels per day of crude
output is offline, according to Reuters calculations, roughly 16 percent
of Canada's crude production. The outage is expected to climb as major
players in the region cut production. [O/R]
A Conoco Phillips spokeswoman said the Surmont
oil sands project had been evacuated as a precaution because of
potential highway closures. The fire was roughly 24 miles (38 km) north
of Surmont on Thursday.
The forecast has called for cooler
temperatures and a possibility of rain, offering hope that controlling
the blaze could become easier.
Authorities said there had been no known
casualties from the blaze itself, but fatalities were reported in at
least one vehicle crash along the evacuation route.
Post a Comment