Sask. government says individuals attempted to ‘trespass’ into restricted area of La Ronge airport

Conair Dash 8-400AT Airtankers are parked on the tarmac in Abbotsford, B.C., Friday, April. 26, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ethan Cairns

The Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency (SPSA) says several individuals were caught “attempting to trespass” at the La Ronge airport earlier this week - at a time of continued criticism of the province’s wildfire response.

In a media advisory Wednesday, the SPSA said members of its frontline staff reported the group was found at the air operations base on Monday, June 16.

“At any time - but especially during a wildfire crisis - it is unacceptable for anyone to interfere with wildfire and emergency personnel operations,” the advisory read.

The agency went on to encourage residents to respect the safety rules posted around its emergency operations centres.

Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck and MLA for Cumberland Jordan McPhail visited several communities damaged by the fires over the course of June 16-17 - one of which included La Ronge.

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The NDP released a statement shortly after the SPSA advisory – explaining that its members were recording a video in the airport’s parking lot.

“The Sask. Party government’s statement is desperate, ridiculous, and a blatant attempt to distract from the fact that nearly half of their air tankers were secretly grounded during the worst wildfires in a decade,” the NDP statement read.

“Standing in a paid public parking lot to shoot a video is not trespassing.”

However, during a briefing Wednesday afternoon, SPSA President Marlo Pritchard said the trespassing incident was entirely separate from the NDP event.

“The advisory that we sent out had nothing to do with members of the Saskatchewan NDP taking video outside the operation base,” he said during a briefing Wednesday afternoon.

“This was a separate incident that occurred where a group of individuals were trying to get into a restricted area.”

Pritchard went on to say that the trespassing incident occurred around 5 p.m. Monday and saw a group attempt to walk through a gate into a secure area.

“Our staff stopped them, closed the gates, and as I understand, they left,” he said.

Water bomber capacity

The province’s water bomber fleet has been a topic of interest since Saskatchewan declared a state of emergency in late May.

On Monday, the NDP highlighted that the province’s newest addition to its water bomber fleet, a Conair Dash 8-Q400AT airtanker, was forced to sit idle – due to a lack of qualified pilots.

• Sask. NDP say new water bomber grounded due to lack of pilots, province says training to resume in July

SPSA officials quickly revealed that four of its pilots were training to operate the new aircraft – and had completed simulator training as well as other requirements.

Due to the provincial state of emergency and overall worsening fire season across Canada, the agency put the training efforts on hold and reallocated the pilots to other aircraft.

The province also noted that there is a critical shortage of aircraft maintenance engineers - and said it is working to acquire more personnel.

On Wednesday, the NDP Opposition continued to highlight issues with the province’s aerial firefighting resources.

“Nearly half of Saskatchewan’s existing water bombers fleet was also quietly ground grounded, without any public explanation during what has been described as one of the worst fire seasons in over a decade,” Beck said at a news conference Wednesday.

According to the Government of Saskatchewan, the province operates four Convair 580A land-based air tankers, six CL-215T turbine powered water-scooping air tankers and seven smaller “bird-dog” aircraft – which guide air tankers and direct other air traffic near wildfires.

Mandatory inspections caused two of the CL-215Ts to be unavailable for five days this fire season – while another CL-215T is out for the season due to “extensive structural inspections and repairs.”

Two CV580s are currently grounded due to unavailable parts and necessary maintenance. One of the planes is expected to be up and running by the end of the month while the other is grounded until further notice due to a failed propeller.

The province noted that extra aircraft were also commissioned from other jurisdictions to help fight the blazes.

“We have contacts with other provinces and some of the American states who have generously provided other resources, water tankers, air bombers, we’ve contracted over 40 helicopters to help put out these fires,” Minister of Public Safety Tim McLeod said Wednesday.

Regardless, McPhail and the NDP believe that the necessary maintenance on all of the province’s firefighting aircraft should have been taken into account ahead of the fire season.

“Our air operations should have had all of the resources at the ready and safe and able condition at the beginning of wildfire season,” he said.

“I can only imagine how incredibly frustrating that is to some of the folks we talked to yesterday,” Beck added. “Some of the folks who lost their homes. Is there a guarantee that everything would have been saved? No, but we sure as hell should have done everything we could about it.”