Alberta wildfire evacuees now number 7,500; Little Red River Cree Nation fully evacuated

Jason Saovord, his girlfriend, their kids and his girlfriend's sister rolled into Edmonton early Sunday morning, having travelled hundreds of kilometres from northern Alberta to stay in a hotel for shelter.

They are among thousands of people from Little Red River Cree Nation fleeing the Semo Complex wildfire, a group of out-of-control wildfires in the High Level forest area. An evacuation order was issued Saturday afternoon, as one of the fires encroached about two kilometres from Highway 58 — the one thoroughfare in the area.

"We lose those roads, the power goes out — yeah, we're scared to lose it all," said Saovord, who lives in John D'Or Prairie. "Three communities all go up."

Little Red River Cree Nation, which has about 5,500 members, is made up of three communities: Fox Lake, Garden River and John D'Or Prairie. Garden River was evacuated last week due to the wildfire, but the Alberta Emergency Management Agency (AEMA) issued an evacuation order for Fox Lake and John D'Or Prairie around 12:30 p.m. Saturday.

The communities have been entirely evacuated as of Sunday afternoon, and Highway 58 is closed at the Beaver Ranch turn off, Alberta RCMP said in an advisory. 

A spokesperson for AEMA, which oversees and leads responses to emergencies and disasters, told CBC News Sunday afternoon there are about 7,500 wildfire evacuees in Alberta — thousands more than the roughly 1,100 it reported on Friday.

Billy-Joe Moberly, also of John D'Or Prairie, answered a call for bus drivers, so he drove around the community to pick up families who needed a ride.

The drive out was "crazy," Moberly said. There is construction on the way, so the road is graded.

"The dust was flying all over the place. Sometimes, you barely could see — sometimes, maybe just five feet in front of you," he said.

Alberta Wildfire reported 158 total active wildfires as of 3:45 p.m. Sunday, according to its dashboard.

The Semo Complex wildfire spans nearly 183,400 hectares combined — more than twice the size of Edmonton. The fire approaching the nation's communities has grown to more than 96,200 hectares, but Christie Tucker, Alberta Wildfire's information unit manager, told CBC News it did not creep much closer to the highway, nor the communities.

"Semo did benefit yesterday from the smoke, finally, and we did see a reduction in wildfire activity in the area," Tucker said.

Hot and dry weather is still expected in the area over the coming days, according to an Alberta Wildfire update.

Environment and Climate Change Canada's seven-day forecast suggests High Level might get rain Tuesday.