If there is one vehicle that isn鈥檛 in short supply in rural Canadian cities and towns, it鈥檚 pickup trucks.
That鈥檚 one of the reasons why GlobalMedic, an Etobicoke-based charity that specializes in rapid emergency response, wants provincial and federal support to create an inventory of specialized compact firefighting units that can be mounted on the back of pickup trucks.
The devices, called fire skids, feature 1,000-litre water tanks, pumps and hoses and are constructed to fit perfectly into any pickup truck 鈥 effectively turning these consumer vehicles into instant fire trucks.
On Saturday morning, a skid sent by from Edmonton to Yellowknife, where firefighters have been frantically trying to protect the city of 22,000 from threatening wildfires, arrived on the front lines. The charity has also offered another fire skid to West Kelowna and Kelowna, also under threat from unprecedented blazes.
鈥淚magine that you鈥檝e got these firefighters, people that want to defend their town and their city, but they don鈥檛 have enough apparatus. Wouldn鈥檛 that be heartbreaking? So to get equipment like this up there, it鈥檚 the right move,鈥 GlobalMedic executive director and founder Rahul Singh told the Star. 鈥淲e鈥檙e used to fighting fires in the forest. We鈥檙e not used to defending cities. So when we defend cities, we need a heck of a lot more apparatus like this.鈥
Singh said his charity has approached both the federal and provincial governments to set up a fire skid 鈥渓ibrary鈥 where up to 50 units, as well as lengths of hose, could be placed across the country for lending to municipalities and First Nations under threat of wildfires. The units could then be sent back to GlobalMedic to be refurbished and made ready for the next jurisdiction that needs them.
So far, there has been interest from the province, Singh says, but he has not heard back from the federal government. For now, he says GlobalMedic has used its own money raised through fundraising to purchase two fire skids and is asking the public to donate so the organization can purchase more.
鈥淭his is a really bad fire year but next year is going to be a fire year again,鈥 he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just a matter of getting folks the kit and equipment that they need.鈥
For its part, the Ontario government is joining the fight by sending people and equipment to both the Northwest Territories and British Columbia.
Some 70 firefighters, support staff and command personnel have been deployed to the West over the past few days, with an additional 12 people flying out Saturday, according to an official from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry.
On Monday the province plans to ship 2,000 lengths of hose, 40 pump kits, 150 hose bags and lithium-ion batteries for two-way radios.
There are more than 200 wildfires burning in the N.W.T., including one about 15 kilometres west of Yellowknife, prompting an evacuation order for the capital city Wednesday.
Meanwhile, B.C. is under a state of emergency as wildfires continue to burn in several areas of the province, including the Okanagan, where some 2,400 homes are under an evacuation order in West Kelowna and several properties have been lost.
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