Frequency defence is no justification for trysts

As wildfire season rages, new book explores the frontlines of battling Canadian blazes

Mother Nature’s talking but we haven’t been listening, according to Jesse Winter, author of Wild Fire: Dispatches from a Country Ablaze, a book, released earlier this summer detailing Canada’s wildfire woes.

Currently, almost 1,000 wildfires across Northwestern Ontario, British Columbia, the Prairies, Northwest Territories and eastern provinces are burning in Canada. Forest fires also continue to wreak havoc in France, Spain and other European countries, and in the U.S. states of Oregon, California, Florida and Texas. While 2023 still rates as the world’s worst wildfire season, 2026 is hot on its heels.

Winter, a Vancouver-based, award-winning climate disaster photojournalist, spent more than two years on Wild Fire, his first book. In-depth research included working with firefighting crews and environmentalists as well as talking to researchers, politicians and evacuees. He says we need to rethink our views on wildfires or be prepared to watch more land go up in flames.

Canada, Winter writes, is “a country almost perfectly designed to burn.” At least 70 per cent of boreal forests, which cover one-third of the country, are stuffed with highly flammable spruce, fir, pine and tamarack trees as well as aspen, poplar and birch. With a wealth of available fuel, it’s no surprise, he writes, that an area twice the size of Vancouver Island burns every summer in Canada.

We’re giving, they’re taking — where’s the win?

In the give-and-take of negotiations so far, Canada seems to be doing all the giving, while the United States does all the taking.

In the last few days, the Canadian government said it was backing away from a five per cent levy to be paid by American streaming services such as Amazon and Netflix after, earlier, dropping the three per cent digital services tax. Then, there was what now appears to be succumbing to American President Donald Trump over the Gordie Howe International Bridge, where Canada agreed to let the U.S. share the net revenues from the bridge, even though Canada paid for the entire construction.

Now, Prime Minister Mark Carney is signalling he won’t use energy exports to the United States as a bargaining chip in the current talks on the Canada-U.S.-Mexico free trade agreement, saying he didn’t “see the value” of using Canada’s energy exports to the U.S. as a trade bargaining chip.

“Canadians are reliable,” Carney said Wednesday in Red Deer, Alta. “One of the biggest commodities, arguably the best, is trust. People trust us, and so, when you’re a supplier of a key commodity, key service, you’ve got to think really hard about not supplying.”

Pimicikamak FN locked down, police hunt for suspect after fatal shooting

Pimicikamak Cree First Nation, also known as Cross Lake, remains under lockdown as RCMP Major Crime Services investigate a shooting that left a 42-year-old man dead.

RCMP said officers were notified by local First Nation Safety Officers at about 9:30 p.m. Friday about a seriously injured person on Main Road in the community. Officers found two males at the scene, including one with a gunshot wound.

The 42-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene by EMS. The second male was not injured and did not require medical attention, police said.

Manitoba RCMP Major Crime Services, along with Cross Lake RCMP and Forensic Identification Services, are investigating. Police said the suspect is believed to be known to the person shot and may still be in the community.

Rollins becomes fifth councillor to bow out of fall election

Sherri Rollins says she’s withdrawing her bid to keep her city hall seat after eight years, citing her concerns about the “gradual erosion of the role played by council” and the struggle to work co-operatively with the mayor’s office.

Brandon laying groundwork for Arabian championship

BRANDON — It’s time to dish the dirt on what’s about to happen at Brandon’s Keystone Centre.

Hundreds of horses and hundreds more spectators are about to descend on the site for Canada’s National Arabian Championship Aug. 6 to 15, and before that happens, the staging surface has to be perfect.

“We have been working on this day in and day out,” said Devin Epp, sales manager in the Ag Centre at the Keystone Centre.

Since July 24, staff have been working on a 24-hour schedule to build the competition floor. Dirt was hauled into the arena and has since been worked into place with tractors and hand-pushed equipment.

Wild weather uproots trees across city, leaves thousands in Manitoba without power

This summer’s latest barrage of severe thunderstorms caused widespread property damage and power outages for more than 30,000 Manitoba Hydro customers, mostly in Winnipeg, as winds of up to 133 km/h wreaked havoc.

Charleswood resident Ian Glover’s house had minor damage compared with a neighbour’s home, where a large, uprooted poplar tree crashed through the roof while the storm pummelled Winnipeg late Wednesday night and early Thursday.

“I opened the window after I woke up (around 6 a.m.) and the tree — oh my God,” Glover said. “I got my wife up and she couldn’t believe it. I was totally blown away. (Our neighbour) said the branch went right through the house into their living room.”

Glover was thankful his neighbours were not injured. Some of the tree’s outer branches clipped the corner of his home.