Meet the Indigenous fire teams fighting to end the blazes in B.C. and beyond

TORONTO -

Over this past week, Indigenous fire response teams in British Columbia have been critical in stopping flames, protecting property and guiding firefighters through difficult terrain.

But Indigenous crews across the country say governments have let too much of their intergenerational knowledge fall by the wayside.

Following a record-breaking heat wave, more than 200 wildfires have caused untold levels of destruction across British Columbia. Working alongside the BC Wildfire Service in stopping flames are volunteer fire teams made up of dozens of Skeetchestn Indian Band members whose sense of responsibility is “immense.”

“Everybody here is doing their absolute most. But most of us feel we're not doing enough,” said Joanne Hammond, who’s the director of Skeetchestn Natural Resources -- a group which normally looks after archeology, forestry and cultural heritage sites.

But during a crisis like this, they’ve been coordinating all emergency response in the area.

Volunteer Skeetchestn Fire Watchers track the path of fires and direct spots for firefighters to target.

Others have set up physical barriers otherwise called fireguards, which successfully steered the fires away from their reserve and the residences of nearby ranchers.

Using Indigenous expertise to tackle wildfire is THE WAY FORWARD. Props to @BCGovFireInfo crews on the ground for working stride for stride with Skeetchestn on the #SparksLake fire. https://t.co/tEEd077q88

— Joanne Hammond/SKEETCHESTN NR (@KamloopsArchaeo) July 7, 2021

And, early on, Indigenous fire teams evacuated the band’s reserve just northwest of Kamloops, as the Sparks Lake wildfires spread across nearly 400 square kilometers.

“They leave everything in our trust, in our care,” Hammond told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview. “They're trusting us to look after the entire community so they’ll have something to come back to.”

The Sparks Lake wildfire is seen from the air on June 28, 2021. (B.C. Wildfire Service)

The Sparks Lake wildfire is seen from the air on June 28, 2021. (B.C. Wildfire Service)

Kukpi7 Chief Darrel Draney told CTVNews.ca around 75 Skeetchestn members, staff, and local non-Indigenous people are “leading an unprecedented fire response,” which also includes ensuring water trucks are filled and protecting critical infrastructure serving the local area.

Members of his reserve are guiding and working with government front-line crews in installing rooftop sprinklers and clearing out potential ignition sources, such as dry vegetation.

“The combination of traditional knowledge and Western practices has been key to fighting this fire and will remain at the heart of our response,” Draney said in a press release.

“We believe this First Nations-led, locally informed fire response based in mutual care and cooperation must be a model for successful emergency management in the future.”

First Nations crews do not get the credit they deserve in fire management in Canada. Look at this hotspot map. They've literally stopped the fire at the #Skeetchestn reserve boundary. pic.twitter.com/qUHZW1zDWt

— Amy Christianson (@ChristiansonAmy) July 5, 2021

INDIGENOUS FIRE TEAMS 'DO NOT GET CREDIT'

Amy Christianson, an Alberta-based Métis fire research scientist with the Canadian Forest Service, agreed but felt “First Nations crews do not get the credit they deserve in fire management in Canada.”

Last week, she tweeted that sentence alongside a map of British Columbia, which showed how forest fires hotspots stopped just outside of the Skeetchestn reserve boundary. Christianson said Indigenous fire teams in rural, isolated areas are some of the most overlooked in terms of their impact.

Despite Skeetchestn Indian Band only having 350 people, a fifth of them stayed behind to help stop the fires.

“They really get organized very quickly because they have that kind of underlying knowledge and skills,” Christianson told CTVNews.ca, adding that this intergenerational knowledge is crucial in guiding firefighters to reservoirs and knowing which paths to avoid.

Some of the members of the Skeetchestn Natural Resources crew, some of whose expertise of the land has been critical in preventing the fires from spreading in the region.

“For me, and the communities I work with, there’s a real sense of pride,” she said, and even noted First Nations communities -- unaffected by wildfires -- such as the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nations, have stepped up by hosting wildfire evacuees on their land.

Christianson, who researches communities’ responses to fires, noted there was a similar lack of mainstream acknowledgement of how Indigenous fire crews Whitefish Lake First Nation 459 in Alberta fought to end wildfires there in 2011.

For Indigenous fire teams from across Canada, this lack of recognition is most disheartening on the government level. So some are in the midst of creating new status quos to better highlight their millennia-old knowledge.

'STEWARDS OF THE LAND'

Chad Thomas is the CEO of Yukon First Nations Wildfire -- a rotating group of around 80 Indigenous firefighters who are trained and spend six to four months at a time on the front lines tackling blazes.

“They're drawn to it because it's something that First Nations have been doing on their traditional territories for thousands of years,” Thomas, a member of the Tahltan First Nation in northern B.C. and southern Yukon, told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview.

He said many on his crew grew up “being taught how to be stewards of the land” after listening to stories of their grandparents, aunts or uncles who also fought fires.

Part of the reason Thomas started his organization, which hasn’t been asked to help in B.C., was because in rural Northern Canada, he feels prospective Indigenous firefighters can have more of a place to shine and hone their craft.

Member of the Yukon First Nations Wildfire. (Yukon First Nations Wildfire)

He said far too often, Indigenous fire crews like his aren’t listened to or face far too much resistance from government agencies.

For example, for decades, governments failed to listen to Indigenous knowledge keepers when it came to the need for prescribed burnings, which Natural Resources Canada acknowledges reduces the number of wildfires. Although, it’s a part of provincial and territorial policies now, Thomas said the fires are still too intense -- something Indigenous fire experts have been saying for years.

“When we don't control our forest, Mother Nature's going to let you know that it's upset,” Thomas said, explaining how his crew see their work as more of a legacy.

That’s why a huge part of Yukon First Nations Wildfire’s work involves codifying their intergenerational learnings so, “we will retain this knowledge as an organization and pass it on.”

STATUS QUO 'WON'T DO ANYMORE'

Brady Highway is a member of the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation in Saskatchewan who has fought more than 200 fires in his career. He said there’s a huge gap when it comes to governments directly partnering with Indigenous knowledge keepers and firefighters.

“It doesn’t really make sense for our Indigenous fire crews to get overlooked,” Highway told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview.

He explained that in his province of Saskatchewan, for example, rules put more value on certain types of formal firefighting experience over others. So what ends up happening is people who are the most knowledgeable of the land are only called in for clean-up or tertiary roles, Highway said.

So to help change this, Highway, a project manager for the Indigenous Leadership Initiative, is helping to grow and train a national network of Indigenous Guardians who can help in decision making for tracking and tackling fires, as well as issues involving land use, forest management or conservation.

“We depend on these landscapes to be healthy so it’s really important that we have a way of helping,” Highway said.

Hammond who’s coordinating Indigenous fire teams in B.C. agreed. She added that the status quo -- where Indigenous fire crews aren’t treated as true collaborators -- “won’t do anymore.”

She called for full-time First Nations liaisons within provincial bodies like BC Wildfire Service, so “that when the emergency happens, they are there.”

“You can’t just call on someone every three years and expect that to work,” Hammond said.

“First Nations communities are the experts at their land and how to look after it. And they need to be involved in a fairly formal and aggressive way in the fire response structure that provincial governments run.”