A major fire management team from the Society for the Protection of Forests Against Fire (SOPFEU) was expected in the middle of the afternoon on Thursday in Chapais, where half the population of this small municipality in the Nord-du- Quebec had to be evacuated due to a forest fire.
“The fire has not been brought under control yet, it is still out of control. However, he has not progressed further, so it is still good news, ”said the mayor of Chapais, Isabelle Lessard, in a press briefing around 1:00 p.m.
The SOPFEU experts, she continued, will be able to determine the foreseeable progression of the blaze “and that will allow us to really know a little more about how it will unfold in the coming days, when people will be able to return to their homes”.
Some 500 residences containing approximately 800 local citizens, nearly half of the local population, were evacuated. These evacuations were voluntary in some cases, but mandatory in others, the fire approaching 100 meters, sometimes 50 meters from some of them.
No material damage has been reported for the moment, but it is not impossible that the water dropped by the air tankers affected some residences.
Suspicious origin?
The young mayor, elected at the age of 21 in 2021, specified that the Sûreté du Québec has dispatched reinforcements from Roberval, Saint-Félicien and Dolbeau and that investigators are looking into the possibility that the fire, which extended over a little less than 1400 hectares at midday Thursday, or of suspicious origin.
In Quebec, the Minister of Public Security, François Bonnardel, said he was concerned, and not only by the situation in Chapais. “It’s worrying when you see these fires all over the territory,” he said.
“We are on the lookout and we even hope for a little rain,” he added.
A dozen forest fires
A second fire of about 500 hectares, north of Sept-Îles, on the North Shore, is getting out of control, but has not led to evacuations. There too, tanker planes are fighting hard against the devastating elements.
SOPFEU is grappling with a dozen forest fires across the province and reports that the situation has improved in Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean, where two of them are considered to be under control and a third is contained. .
Faults caused by overheating
These fires have consequences across the province as Hydro-Quebec reported Thursday that more than 250,000 of its customers have been without power, especially in the regions of Montreal, Montérégie, Laurentides, Lanaudière, Quebec and Laval. .
The state company’s Twitter account explains that “the situation is linked to forest fires in the Côte-Nord region” and that it is deprived of two transmission lines for this reason. It specifies, however, that the installations are not damaged, but that “the smoke and the heat have triggered protection mechanisms on the network” and that “the resumption of current is done gradually”.
Avoid traveling in the forest
The government of Quebec issued, Thursday morning, a preventive notice concerning the risk of forest fires and seeks the cooperation of the entire population.
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forests, as well as the Ministry of Public Security, are asking Quebecers to avoid or restrict their trips to the forest as much as possible over the next few days, due to the extreme flammability index. and worrying fires in progress in certain places in Quebec.
This recommendation, made in conjunction with SOPFEU, targets all regions of Quebec. Not only does it aim to reduce the risk of fire, but also to facilitate SOPFEU’s operations.
Already, for the past few days, it has been prohibited to make open fires in or near the forest throughout Quebec.