Brandon students to atone for actions that led to forest fire

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 07/06/2012 (4940 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

HOW do you say you’re sorry for burning down 53,008 hectares of forest?

How do you atone for starting a fire that destroyed trappers’ cabins and their livelihoods, drove wildlife from their habitat and ended up costing the province $4.5 million to extinguish?

“There’s no firm plan yet,” Brandon school board chairman Mark Sefton said Wednesday as he talked about the school field trip that became a burning issue in northern Manitoba.

A Manitoba Conservation investigation concluded a Brandon School Division (BSD) Eco-Odyssey field trip in 2008 was likely responsible for starting a massive and devastating forest fire in the Grand Rapids area, Sefton said.

A delegation from the school division has recently been to Grand Rapids to begin reconciliation with Misipawistik Cree Nation, which could lead to Brandon students spending time in the community and working with the local school.

At the session, area residents proposed several ways in which BSD could make amends, including rebuilding trappers’ cabins, providing 100 cords of firewood for home heating and “having BSD students attend a powwow in the summer to develop an appreciation for the effects of the fire.”

The Manitoba Conservation report said there was “a balance of probabilities” the field trip caused the forest fire, Sefton said.

The most likely cause of the fire appears to be efforts by students to burn used toilet paper in the bush, he said.

The students had already left the area before the fire was spotted and were driving on Highway 6 when they learned from the RCMP there was a forest fire spreading in the area, Sefton said.

Thousands of hectares of forest were destroyed, animals died and now, years later, the trapline for Misipawistik Cree Nation is still greatly affected.

Sefton said the province decided not to try to recover the costs of the fire damage, or the firefighting operation that ensued. “The Eco-Odyssey program no longer exists,” Sefton said.

“Certainly, the trustees were very concerned about the losses in the area,” he said. “The pine martens and fishers have all but disappeared from the area.”

Officials from Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, a northern chiefs’ organization, could not be reached Wednesday.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca