In the summer of 2023 the NWT and WBNP faced devastating forest fires. Our local firefighting team worked endlessly to protect both Park and Town facilities. In July we faced a crisis of resources. WBNP Officers were burning themselves out working on this series of Fires. It was asked that if any other departments had staff to spare to send them on a deployment to work logistics on the WBNP Fire Complex. I then spent two weeks deployed to the Complex fire as the logistics team food lead. The days were all long 12+ hours shifts and moral was not super high. Below is an except from my interview with Haida Davies-McDermott and the Climate Disaster Project.
“I was just in charge of food. I was in charge of feeding the 200 firefighters and people who are working on behind the scenes. That was my job, is get them the food, get the chef the food, the chef will cook the food. All you have to do is go and buy the things and make sure that you’re accommodating for everybody’s allergies. Even when that was going, I was super stressed in that time because not only was I getting the updates, but I was physically, seeing the planes fly and seeing the people get off the choppers covered in soot, covered in ash. There were days where the sky was orange and sepia from all the ash in the air. “
The full interview can be read on CabinRadio.
