{"id":76167,"date":"2016-05-19T23:06:51","date_gmt":"2016-05-20T03:06:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=76167"},"modified":"2016-05-19T23:06:51","modified_gmt":"2016-05-20T03:06:51","slug":"fort-mcmurray-fire-pushes-saskatchewan-no-imminent-danger-communities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2016\/05\/19\/fort-mcmurray-fire-pushes-saskatchewan-no-imminent-danger-communities\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort McMurray fire pushes into Saskatchewan; no imminent danger to communities"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Untitled<\/a><\/p>\n

REGINA\u2014The Fort McMurray wildfire that’s been described as a beast has now spread into Saskatchewan, but officials say there’s no imminent threat to any community.<\/p>\n

The massive fire, which has grown to 5,000 square kilometres, has burned nearly eight square kilometres into Saskatchewan.<\/p>\n

Emergency management commissioner Duane McKay said it is still about 30 kilometres away from La Loche, the nearest Saskatchewan community.<\/p>\n

\u201cLa Loche is situated against a lake, there’s old burns to the north as well, so we don’t see a direct fire threat to La Loche,\u201d McKay said Thursday.<\/p>\n

But he said people should keep in mind that the wildfire has been completely unpredictable.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was anticipated to be in Saskatchewan just over a week ago and it stalled out. It is now moving again, but weather forecasts are indicating that should slow,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should see a shift in wind direction, which should mitigate the growth of that fire into Saskatchewan.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fires near La Loche last year mean there’s less brush and trees to burn as the Fort McMurray fires advances.<\/p>\n

McKay said smoke is a big concern in La Loche.<\/p>\n

There’s hope that winds from the east will help clear out some of the smoke. Officials said there have been no evacuations.<\/p>\n

The wind will also help Saskatchewan firefighting crews who have been working on the eastern flank of the blaze, said Steve Roberts, executive director of Saskatchewan wildfire management.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will also allow our crews access to the base of the fire in less smoky conditions, so we can engage the fire better,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo because of those winds we don’t expect a large or rapid ingress into Saskatchewan from this fire in the next 24, 36 hours.\u201d<\/p>\n

A fire command team has been set up in La Loche and a cache of equipment and resources is being established in Buffalo Narrows, about 100 kilometres east of the village.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

REGINA\u2014The Fort McMurray wildfire that’s been described as a beast has now spread into Saskatchewan, but officials say there’s no …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":65579,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[10611,10196,1139,3357],"class_list":["post-76167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-fort-mcmurray","tag-la-loche","tag-saskatchewan","tag-wildfire"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76167\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}