Why the military's response to flooding in Yukon is so different from the N.W.T.

Ninety soldiers dropped out of a Hercules aircraft onto Yukon land late Monday night.

They came to fill sandbags, mitigate flood damage and conduct evacuations as the territory grapples with exceedingly high water levels in the Southern Lakes region. 

It was the same kind of relief Sean Whelly, the mayor of Fort Simpson, N.W.T., wanted sent to his village a few months before. In May, flood waters submerged village streets, houses and cars, forcing hundreds to evacuate. 

Instead, the federal government committed two Canadian Rangers. 

"I'm just in the dark about the whole thing," Whelly told CBC. "I just can't understand why Fort Simpson and the Dehcho didn't get the same kind of attention."

CBC set out to find out why military response to extreme flooding in both territories, just months apart, is so different. 

N.W.T. municipalities expected to ask for help

Municipalities are the first ones to respond to an emergency in Canada, according to the federal department of public safety. 

The N.W.T.'s emergency response plan says communities have to make a formal request to the territorial government if they need more support for local relief efforts. 

Then, the N.W.T.'s emergency management organization (EMO) evaluates whether they have enough resources to help. In some situations, the territory will call the federal government for backup. 

The village didn't need extra support in the early days of spring breakup, Whelly said. 

The tide turned when water levels breached 16.5 metres, a level never seen before in the village's semi-annual spring flood.  

"We did not have any food in our warehouse to give out, and there was a weekend coming up," Whelly said. "We realized things could get a lot worse."

Community members started to flee, setting up in a tent city on higher ground or boarding flights to stay in arenas in far-off N.W.T. communities. 

Ranger request 'met the need' in Fort Simpson 

Whelly said he immediately called Premier Caroline Cochrane to ask for 20 to 30 military members.

The village's SAO then submitted a request through to the territorial EMO asking for more military help. 

"We were told verbally … after a week or so that the military wasn't going to be coming," Whelly said. "People in the community were openly asking 'whatever happened?'" 

Jay Boast, a spokesperson from the N.W.T. 's department of municipal affairs, told CBC in a statement that the territory submitted a request to the Canadian Armed Forces for Canadian Ranger support.

Canadian Rangers are "self-sufficient" members of the military's reserve forces who work in "remote, isolated and coastal" communities, according to their website. 

The goal behind that, the statement continued, was to decrease the risk of COVID-19 exposure from the southern provinces and from Yellowknife. The capital was also grappling with an unprecedented outbreak from the N.J. MacPherson cluster. 

"At the time … COVID[-19] case counts in southern jurisdictions remained high," the statement reads. "There was a strong desire to not bring in people from the South or move people in and out of smaller communities to manage the risk." 

Using two rangers already stationed in Fort Simpson, it continues, "met the need and was determined to be the best course of action."  

Conflicting messages

The Municipal Affairs department told Cabin Radio a different story in June. 

Once the department found out only two Canadian Rangers would be available on the ground, they reached out again to the Canadian Armed Forces to ask for more resources, according to Cabin's reporting. 

The N.W.T. was told the military didn't have the "ability to move and sustain Rangers away from their home communities at the level requested by Fort Simpson." 

They were also told that some of the Rangers weren't "self-sustaining" and needed accommodations at the flood zone. 

Whelly said he told Premier Cochrane the troops could have set up on one side of the village's tent city, put in place for evacuees during the flood. Separating the military camp from the village camp would've limited any possible COVID-19 exposure, he continued. 

"I noticed in Yukon … they're going towards COVID[-19], not running away from it," he said. 

CBC has reached out to the Canadian Armed Forces to get their side of the story. They are currently working on a reply.

'We'll call them anyway'

Richard Mostyn, Yukon's community services minister, started talking to the federal government about the need for flood relief in June, when water levels started to rise on the Teslin River and in the Carmacks and Marsh Lake districts.  

At the same time, Yukon was hit with the worst COVID-19 outbreak they've seen since the beginning of the pandemic. 

Last Saturday, Mostyn reached out directly to Bill Blair, Canada's public safety minister, to ask for military assistance. By Sunday, Blair tweeted that over 100 military personnel, under Operation LENTUS, would be coming to the territory. 

Mostyn said there was no time to ask community governments for their input. 

"In an emergency like this, you really have to act very quickly," he said. "People's lives, properties depend on quick decisions." 

The decisiveness was supported by people like Patrick Brown, operations manager for the Carcross/Tagish First Nation.

"It's just unprecedented … we've never seen anything like this before," Brown said. "We've been acting quickly with support from … all the connecting governments." 

Fort Simpson, N.W.T., is already thinking about how to do things differently, based on the response in Yukon.

The village is conducting an internal investigation to figure out its role in the flood response.

Whelly said the village waited until the military was really needed before making that call — but he might do things differently next year. 

"I guess next year we'll call them anyway," he said. "As soon as the evacuation order comes, we'll call … so they can load up and come over here."