They lost their home to a wildfire. Now they are helping neighbours protect their own
CBC
Shantelle Williams will never forget the crackle of flames as an inferno engulfed her family farm northeast of Edmonton.
She also can't forget the faces of those who came to help her family that night.
Williams lost her home and family business in Sturgeon County on Saturday night as a fire spread from the Redwater Provincial Recreation Area to forest and farmland.
The fire that destroyed Williams's farmstead has continued to burn out of control, triggering evacuation orders and incinerating more than 2,000 hectares.
All was calm when Williams and her husband, Cole Williams, and their three young children went out Saturday evening for a night of bowling.
Plumes of smoke visible above their property and a panicked call from a neighbour hours later brought them home.
Williams and her husband were greeted by an inferno — flying embers and hissing flames metres away from their house.
"The sound of that fire coming through those trees, you could just feel it," she told CBC News in an interview Wednesday.
"And the heat, your mouth was dry.
"The smoke had just come in, it had gone from blue skies to dark orange. It wasn't a good sign."
Within 13 minutes, their home was ablaze.
The barns and outbuildings that made up their family business, a cow-calf operation, were destroyed.
Williams rushed to get her livestock, including a herd of more than 150 cattle, and family pets to safety.
"We didn't even have time to think about it," she said. "I couldn't look at it because I feel like I would have just broken down. I just kept pushing on."
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