Melted headlights and peeling paint: residents escape wildfires in southern N.W.T.
'We knew that people had come through some pretty harrowing experiences to get from Hay River'
The N.W.T. government is urging remaining residents in Hay River and Fort Smith to go to the airport to evacuate from the community.
Highway 2, between Hay River and Enterprise, is closed. Highway 5, from Hay River to Fort Smith, is also closed, as is the portion of Highway 1 between Kakisa and Hay River.
"Conditions are dangerous and will continue to worsen," reads a post to social media from the territorial government's page.
Hay River issued an evacuation order on Sunday after strong winds pushed a wildfire about 40 kilometres toward the community.
In an update Monday at 10:30 a.m. the Town of Hay River's emergency management organization said that all long-term care residents and patients had been evacuated to Yellowknife.
"It is critical that evacuees get on the plane as the road exit is not available and uncertain for the foreseeable future," reads the update.
'Please leave,' says premier
Premier Caroline Cochrane urged residents of communities under evacuation orders to "please leave."
"When people decide to stay and it's all good intentions, they decide to stay and help others, or they decide to stay to protect their property, they're actually putting more people at risk," she told CBC News Network.
"Not only do our emergency supports have to focus on fighting the fire, we also have to provide supports to make sure that people that aren't part of the emergency response are safe."
'You got to go now'
Jane Groenewegen was at a friend's place in nearby Enterprise on Sunday when an RCMP officer knocked on the door.
"They said, 'You got to go now'," said Groenewegen. While the officer was at the door, she said a message came over his radio that the fire had breached the highway between Hay River and Enterprise.
From Enterprise to Indian Cabins, just across the Alberta border, Groenewegen said the sky had "thick black smoke and dark like night."
Once in Indian Cabins, Groenewegen stopped on the side of the road with other Hay River residents.
"There were vehicles that had melted lens covers on their headlights, tail lights, all the paint on the side of their vehicles was all like crackled up and busted up," she said. "We knew that people had come through some pretty harrowing experiences to get from Hay River."
While most residents have been evacuated to Grande Prairie, Alta., Groenewegen is now staying at her ranch in High Level, Alta. — and she's not the only one.
"We have a couple of houses on the property, and I'm at the one house and every room was full last night with guests that had to flee the fires," she said.
She added that she expects more people to arrive on Monday. She also has help co-ordinating a location for people to park campers and trailers.
"We call it the evacuation commune."
On Sunday, most of the communities in the South Slave region were ordered to evacuate due to multiple wildfires either directly threatening communities or threatening to close highways connecting them to the rest of the territory.
As of Monday morning, Fort Smith, Salt River First Nation, Hay River, Kátł'odeeche First Nation, Enterprise and Jean Marie River are all under evacuation orders. Kakisa remains under an evacuation alert.
This is Hay River and Kátł'odeeche First Nation's third evacuation in two years, and second this summer due to wildfires — yet it's the first time Groenewegen has left in an emergency.
"This one, I was on the wrong side of the fire," she said.
Last she'd heard, her husband and son were still in Hay River.
During the other evacuations, she said she stayed behind to offer accommodations to firefighters, pilots and other emergency workers.
With an ongoing communications outage in the region, getting news from loved ones has been difficult.
"I hope that they're OK. I've had no word from them whatsoever."
During Sunday's evacuation, another fire sparked up near Paradise Gardens outside of Hay River.
Monday morning, fire officials reported there was damage in the area and in Enterprise, but the extent is not yet clear.
"I think people are just in shock at the magnitude and all of what's happened here," said Groenewegen.
Enterprise residents safe: mayor
Michael St Amour, the mayor of Enterprise, said Sunday's evacuation of his community went "very well."
About 115 residents — including a few Fort Smith evacuees — had to leave the small community.
"All the residents are out of Enterprise right now, all we have to worry about is structural [damage]," said St Amour.
When he left on Sunday at 6 p.m., he said there were two buildings burning on the west side of the community, but had not yet received an update on the extent of the total damage.
"I'm getting anxious," said St Amour. "I wanna go … That's the hard part, not knowing."
This video, posted by Jordan Evoy on Facebook early Monday morning, shows him driving through Enterprise, N.W.T. A warning, it contains strong language.
Written by Francis Tessier-Burns with files from Hilary Bird