Wildfire destroys 150 homes in Halifax area; province banning activity in all forests

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More than 150 homes had been lost to the intense wildfire in the Halifax area by Tuesday afternoon, as evacuation zones continued to expand and exhausted crews spent a third straight day battling the blaze in hot, windy conditions.

The province is currently fighting 13 active wildfires, three of which are out of control – including the massive one that originated in Upper Tantallon, a Halifax suburb, and now covers roughly 788 hectares. A total of 19,888 hectares are on fire across the province.

“We’ve got more fires than we have resources to support them,” Scott Tingley, manager of forest protection at Nova Scotia’s Department of Natural Resources, said during a news conference. When making difficult decisions on where to direct resources, Mr. Tingley said, the province is prioritizing safety and human life, then infrastructure and finally natural resources.

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More than 16,000 people from Tantallon and Hammonds Plains, west of Halifax, remain under evacuation orders, and on Tuesday evening the province issued an emergency alert calling for more evacuations in the nearby Bedford area because of a new fire and a potential ammonia leak. Meanwhile, Halifax officials are facing questions about a 2021 report from the municipality’s Auditor-General that said three now-evacuated subdivisions had inadequate provisions for fire safety.

The wildfire in the Halifax area has raged since Sunday. A group of 146 firefighters from the city, province and Department of National Defence are battling the blaze, along with three helicopters. “We’ve been using water, raw muscle power and air power and I think that’s helping,” said Dave Meldrum, deputy chief of Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency.

In Shelburne County, in the southwest of the province, an out-of-control fire is burning 19,000 hectares. Ninety provincial and volunteer firefighters and four helicopters are fighting that fire. Another uncontained wildfire in Pubnico, a fishing community more than 300 kilometres south of Halifax, covers 100 hectares. Public schools in affected areas have been closed across the province.

Temperatures are expected to soar into the 30s this week, which could increase the fire’s spread rate.

The winds and heat have already contributed to fires in the southwest, prompting Premier Tim Houston to shut down forests across the province to all activity – including hiking, four-wheeling and hunting – until further notice.

“For God’s sake, stop burning, stop flicking your cigarette butts outside your car window, just stop,” Mr. Houston said while announcing the ban on Tuesday. “Our resources are stretched incredibly thin right now.”

Halifax announced that it would be closing its wooded parks as of 8 a.m. Wednesday.

Bob Robichaud, a warning preparedness meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada, said a mild winter with little snow, followed by a very dry spring, set the conditions for the fires. Climate projections suggest summers in the province will continue to be drier than they have historically been, “so there is potential for increased risk of fire in the future,” he said.

Cathie O’Toole, the Halifax Regional Municipality’s chief administrative officer, told a news conference fire had flattened some homes in Tantallon and left others untouched. “There will be visible scars on the community,” she said.

Halifax Mayor Mike Savage told the same news conference the United Way Halifax is launching a recovery effort to help people who are affected by wildfires as they rebuild their homes and their lives. The organization will assist with basic needs such as groceries and mental-health supports. The city is beginning to contact people whose homes were burned by the wildfires, and may announce on Wednesday morning that some people who were evacuated will be allowed to return home, Mr. Savage said.

Amid the grief and uncertainty, questions swirl about how prepared the city was to deal the wildfire. A 2021 report from the Halifax Regional Municipality’s Auditor-General said Halifax fire managers had warned the city that three of the subdivisions that have now been evacuated were “built without appropriate fire safety specifications, such as inadequate water sources to fight fires.” Those subdivisions are Westwood Hills in Upper Tantallon, White Hills in Hammonds Plains and Indigo Shores.

In response to questions about fire specifications and the availability of water in those subdivisions, Mr. Savage and Ms. O’Toole told reporters Halifax is in the process of hiring four people to address these things. Neither could say how far along the hiring process is, or why it has taken more than a year and a half since the auditor’s report was made public.

But Ms. O’Toole said the city has addressed other issues outlined in the report. Halifax now involves its fire department in the process of approving new development, and has installed additional dry hydrants, which are pipe systems placed in lakes and rivers to be used as water sources for firefighting.

Mr. Meldrum, the deputy fire chief, said adequate water supplies for firefighting are extremely important, and that so far firefighters have had all the resources they need to fight the wildfire.

Halifax officials announced Tuesday afternoon that 151 homes in the area had been lost to the fire. One of them belonged to Terri Kottwitz, who on Sunday opened up her child-care centre in Hammonds Plains, hoping it would be a safe place for parents from the affected area to bring their children. But after a few hours, the blaze had spread. As Ms. Kottwitz watched the flames grow closer, she ordered everyone to clear out.

Hours later, she heard rumours that her daycare had burned to the ground. On Monday night, a stranger posted a video in a community Facebook group that confirmed it.

The next morning, another gut punch: She found a video that showed her house, about 500 metres from the daycare, was also gone, along with at least five other homes on her street.

It was the loss of the daycare that consumed Ms. Kottwitz with grief.

“The centre belonged to the community and to the children and to the families,” she said through tears. “The children are devastated. There’s absolutely nothing left.”