Miscommunication over northern Ont. First Nation fire evacuation

Fire evacuees from Fort Albany First Nation in Ontario's Far North are taking refuge in communities across the northern region, but new information suggests the evacuations got off to a rocky start.

Confusion and miscommunication appears to have made the evacuation of people from Fort Albany more complicated than necessary last week.

Emergency operations company ISN Maskwa, owned by Missanabie Cree First Nation, said it was assisting with getting fire evacuees onto planes, flown down to Kapuskasing and into shelter.

But last Thursday, the company claims there was a last-minute issue with the host community, while planes were in the air.

"They announced that they were pulling out of the program altogether," said Joe Tom Sayers, the general manager of Missanabie Cree Business Corporation.

"Even though we may have had people in the air, that they weren’t prepared to support them, to be taken from, off the planes, from the tarmac, into our buses, to be sent to the Kapuskasing hotels."

Sayers said the company had to redirect planes to Cochrane and then bus dozens of evacuees back to Kapuskasing.

The town issued a news release that day, claiming it had been pushed out of federal evacuation planning this year in favour of ISN Maskwa.

Two days later, the town announced it was reactivated as a host community.

Kapuskasing Mayor Dave Plourde said the airport was always open for evacuees.

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"We don’t receive passengers on a regular basis, so we don’t, mainly for cargo and mainly for shipping stuff out and in. So, really, we don’t have that staff on-hand to take people off," Plourde said.

"If they needed any assistance from the town … I mean, all they had to do was ask."

ISN Maskwa let the town take over operations, but said it is opening an emergency hub office in Kapuskasing for future support.

Sayers said Ottawa tapped the company to take an Indigenous-led approach to First Nations emergency management and it had been working well with host communities, until now.

"Working with municipalities … is very critical to the success and the safety and security of the evacuees themselves," Sayers said.

CTV News reached out to Indigenous Services Canada for comment, but haven’t received one yet.

So far, no other evacuation flights are scheduled for this week and the Cochrane 11 wildfire that prompted the emergency is being held back by fire crews.