Rural Albertans, officials weigh in on evacuation protocols as wildfire season kicks off

As wildfire swept closer to his farm near Wildwood, Alta., Jens Jorgensen made a choice.

The small community 120 kilometres west of Edmonton was under an evacuation order about this time last spring, as fires spread across Yellowhead County.

"Didn't matter what direction we looked — you could see smoke and fire," Jorgensen said, during an interview on his farm on Saturday.

Jorgensen keeps beef cattle, horses and poultry on his farm. He and his wife also run a dog-boarding business. If they left the evacuation zone, they worried they'd be blocked from getting back in to tend to the animals — for who knows how long.

"The animals are dependent on us. If we leave, who feeds them? During that time, the power went out. Without power, there's no water. So our animals, without us, would have had no water, no feed," he said. "I know we would have lost animals in that time."

And so they stayed, relying on generators, gas and supplies they already had on the farm. 

Jorgensen and his neighbours plowed up fire breaks and got ready for the worst, but fortunately the flames never reached them. 

Most Albertans subject to wildfire evacuations in 2023 followed them and left their properties behind. But officials reported encountering those who refused to leave.

Some were farmers, like Jorgensen. A survey of over 600 Yellowhead County residents who were under evacuation last spring found that about a third refused to do so. 

It wasn't just rural residents. In Edson, Mayor Kevin Zahara has spoken with people who lived in town but wouldn't leave, particularly when the community was on its second of three 2023 evacuations — the first two for wildfire, the third for flooding.

"They understood the dangers. Their vehicles were fuelled and packed and ready to go, but they just didn't feel like it was the right opportunity for them to leave at that point in time," Zahara said Saturday.

Like the county, the town commissioned reviews of last year's disaster response. When it comes to people who didn't evacuate, Zahara said they learned that while people were concerned about what could happen to their properties if left unattended, others weren't in a financial position to leave, and didn't know about the transportation and other supports that had been set up to support evacuees.

As mayor, Zahara is the one who has to sign off on evacuation orders. He says it's not a decision that's made lightly.

"This is rural Alberta so people are very, very tough people and they don't want to just leave it at a moment's notice," Zahara said.