Nemeiben Lake cabin owners left devastated by fires

“I’d been there 38 years and it’s not an uncommon occurrence to see that happen. It probably happens every year.”

Irons left the next day at noon. Eventually, he got a phone call from neighbour who was in La Ronge at the time. Irons was told fire had overtaken their area and nothing was left of his cabin.

He said he was instantly overcome with grief.

“My wife and I built that cabin when we were in our early twenties,” said Irons. “Our family has been raised there every summer since.”

On June 14, just a week after his cabin was engulfed in flames, Irons went up to Nemeiben Lake to see the site where his cabin used to sit proudly.

“There’s nothing left,” said Irons, who was noticeably emotional. “I can’t really describe that feeling.”

“It was like losing a family member.”

Irons said they aren’t sure whether they’ll rebuild, but he doesn’t see much of a point to it. He expects that the forest will eventually rejuvenate, but doesn’t think it will happen in his lifetime.

Irons and his wife began leasing the land from the government and built their cabin before they had kids. He said they spent almost every weekend there during the summer, sometimes for weeks at a time.

Since Irons retired, he said he spent even more time up there, often going alone or with friends. In the winter, he would travel there to snowmobile.

Now, there is nothing left and Irons is wondering why, looking to wildfire management for answers.

“They realized there was a fire, and I’m sure there were a lot of fires burning out there but they never made any attempt to save cabins on Nemeiben whatsoever,” he said. “It’s my feeling they could’ve slowed this one down enough to tame it later, if they would’ve put any effort into it whatsoever.”

Water bombers are often in the area passing Iron’s cabin to fill up or to practice their routes in the spring.

“It gives you a level of comfort that they are there. Then when there’s a fire and they’re not there, you kind of wonder what happened,” said Irons.

Saskatchewan fire resource management still hasn’t contacted Irons that his cabin has been destroyed, he said.

“They haven’t contacted me with condolences. They haven’t contacted me with my options or responsibilities,” he continued. “All the cabin owners I know that lost their places have not been contacted by anybody about it.”

Steve Roberts, executive director of wildfire management for the ministry of environment, said they had to prioritize certain things when they were fighting fires, although they were present in the area.

“Our Number 1 priority for the wild fire program is human life. Following that is communities, public infrastructure and the next category below that is other values on the landscape.”

He said remote cabins fall under the category of other values.

“Our efforts up there actually were on those fires. Specifically our priority was the communities being directly threatened,” he said. He stressed that remote cabins are naturally in riskier locations when it comes to fire risks, usually being quite far from communities themselves.

“The remote cabins are not in any community so there are no community evacuation orders because those are established by the local authorities, not individuals,” he said.

According to Roberts, they were also making sure information was available to radio stations for evacuations and other updates.

“They would’ve been warned if they were following media, listening to radios or if they had contacted us. There was smoke in the area, there were aircrafts in the area,” he said.

As far as sprinklers go, Roberts said they would’ve set them up on cabins if they would’ve had the time and man power.

“We, in this case, had higher priorities but normally we would go out and put them up on those values,” he said.

He also suggested people take into account that it’s a high-risk area and consider getting their own sprinklers for fire protection.

Conservation officers have since been out to where the fire was to see what structures, cabins, and homes were affected, Roberts said.

“Now they’re in the process of ensuring that those owners are officially notified where there was actual cabins burnt.”

Because this is an ongoing process, he said they can’t release the results until everyone is notified.

If people are looking into what’s next, Roberts said they are more than willing to provide information for insurance claims.

Lately, none of the fires have grown in size. Roberts said there are four fires still not contained, but only one is new in the last four days.

He warns that fire season goes until the end of August or the beginning of September so home owners in the distant north should take prevention methods and make sure they have secure communication lines to higher populated areas.

As far as Irons is concerned, the outcomes of the fires should’ve been different.

“To me, 17 cabins on that lake is a community just as much as any other community. We all know each other,” he said. “It doesn’t make me feel like [the co-ordinators] were doing their job.”

asoloducha@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @alex_soloducha

by Alex Soloducha

Nemeiben Lake cabin owners left devastated by fires

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