The Canadian government is offering its support to firefighting efforts in California, which is being devastated by fast-moving wildfires.
Emergency Preparedness Minister Harjit Sajjan says some 250 firefighters and aircraft equipment from Ontario, Quebec and Alberta is ready to go, along with the Canadian Forces who are standing by to move personnel and equipment.
The latest wildfires have wrought destruction on Los Angeles and surrounding area, destroying some 10,000 homes and other buildings and claiming the lives of at least 10 people.
Newfoundland actor and comedian Shaun Majumder is among those with property in LA.
He says the biggest factor has been the hurricane-force winds that have been feeding the Altadena fire near Pasadena, and another near the beach in Palisades, which he says has been devastating.
“We’re right in the middle, and thankfully we’ve not gotten any fire, but our wind situation was hurricane-force for two days and we are so blessed that we didn’t have any sparks, as of yet.”
Shaun Majumder (FB/Meta)
Majumder calls the dry spells, high temperatures and strong winds a “perfect storm to create an explosion. The thing that made this so different is the wind.”
Newfoundland author and filmmaker Brian O’Dea also has a property in the area.
O’Dea, who happens to be home in St. John’s working on a new film project, says his daughter, son and their mother are living in the area. He says the Santa Susana winds, which originate in the mountains where they live, are causing the fires to spread far and wide.
O’Dea says his family and a group of volunteers have been “flat out” getting rid of dead brush, but adds the winds are still sending sparks long distances.
“If it does happen to come up their way, there’s a lot of work (that’s) been done for remediation to prevent it from burning houses, but that can travel in the air quite a ways. The sparks, really, they don’t care about if you’ve done fire remediation, they’ll go from one roof to another.”
