Fire crews fight to control blaze near Yellowknife as last remaining residents urged to leave
CTV
The mayor of Yellowknife is urging the city's last remaining residents to leave for safer areas, stressing that while a nearby fire has not touched the territorial capital, it is still not safe for people to return or stick around.
The mayor of Yellowknife is urging the city's last remaining residents to leave for safer areas, stressing that while a nearby fire has not touched the territorial capital, it is still not safe for people to return or stick around.
Officials in the Northwest Territories, where about half of the population has been displaced due to ongoing wildfires, said in an update Friday evening that more than 19,000 people have left Yellowknife to date.
Of the 2,600 people still left in the capital, 1,600 are considered non-essential workers.
"It happens in every community that is trying to evacuate," Yellowknife Mayor Rebecca Alty told CTV News Channel on Saturday.
"There's a few folks that just want to stay and protect their property or they don't think it's real, they think it's not a threat, so it's a challenge, but we'll continue to stress — now is the time to leave. The time is not when it's actually a critical emergency."
Alty said the reason is so crews who are helping to protect the community can "focus on the threat at hand and not trying to get people out of the way of the danger."
"So, again, really encourage anybody, if your family is still here, keep trying to encourage them to leave," she added.
