I remember waking up early on the morning of August 17, 2023, my bags already packed in my car from the night before. As I rose from bed it hit me suddenly that I wasn’t sure when I would be able to return home or what I might return to. I rushed to the bathroom to throw up and allowed myself a moment of panic before telling myself to get it together. After a sweaty struggle getting my cat into his carrier, I headed out on the road, not sure what lay ahead. 

It’s been one year since the entire city of Yellowknife and surrounding areas of Dettah, Ndılǫ and the Ingraham Trail were ordered to evacuate as wildfires burned nearby. It was the first time that a capital city in Canada was fully evacuated. 

It was a stressful summer for many people as nearly 70 per cent of Northwest Territories residents were forced to flee their homes while fires raged across the territory and the skies turned orange with smoke. Dozens of people lost their homes, businesses, and cabins, and many residents continue to face incredibly difficult circumstances.

Reporting on the evacuations and wildfires while also being an evacuee myself was a unique experience, one I am both grateful for and never want to repeat. It’s also something I hope both myself and others can learn from. 

In many ways, I was very privileged. I was able to drive out of town in my own car and took my cat with me. I avoided the long line ups and unsafe driving conditions that many other evacuees faced. I had a safe and comfortable place to stay in the N.W.T. I didn’t have to endure weeks without pay while the bills kept coming. My home didn’t burn down. 

It was also a lot of work and stress trying to keep thousands of people informed while neglecting to properly take care of my own mental health and wellbeing. 

The first week of the evacuation I barely slept, filled with anxiety and feeling immense pressure. I worked from the moment I woke up to when I went to bed, and couldn’t fall asleep as my mind raced and heart pounded. It got to the point that the lack of sleep began to affect my cognitive abilities. Working beside my editor one day, I made him repeat a simple sentence to me multiple times because I just couldn’t grasp what he was saying. I also couldn’t recall basic information that I knew I should remember. My emotions became heightened and I was often in tears. I felt incredibly alone and like no one cared. I remember Googling the impacts of sleep deprivation and whether it could cause long-term damage. 

I was deeply disappointed with how little both the city and N.W.T. government had prepared for Yellowknife’s evacuation as well as their subsequent response. 

While a citywide evacuation may have been unprecedented, it was not completely unforeseen and governments did have time to plan. It was nearly a decade after the N.W.T’s infamous summer of smoke, the territory’s previous worst wildfire season on record in 2014. It was more than three years after governments were forced to adapt to the COVID-19 pandemic. And it was three months after Hay River and Kátł’odeeche First Nation were evacuated for the first time that summer. Governments could have learned from those experiences and chosen to be proactive rather than reactive.

The night that the city and N.W.T. governments announced Yellowknife’s evacuation, they provided little information that residents needed to hear, such as where they should go, what were the rules around pets, what supports would be available and why an evacuation was being called when we had just been assured that wouldn’t happen. Local media struggled to get answers to those vital questions as scads of national reporters filled the press conference with their own questions. We know now that officials didn’t have those answers as they had not prepared for this and governments were struggling to communicate with each other and understand their responsibilities. 

One thing that still haunts me is how N.W.T. communities who were not ordered to evacuate were left on their own to navigate being cut off from transportation and supply routes. The Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation and Frontier Lodge, for example, a fly-in community on the East Arm of Great Slave Lake, paid tens of thousands of dollars out of their own pockets for a charter to fly food in and fly people out who had been trapped at the lodge after days of anxiety and as shelves ran bare. 

As the days went on, continuing to try and get answers and information from governments was often frustrating. There was no central place to find information so Cabin Radio quickly became that resource. Reporters regularly scoured the many Facebook pages, websites and other places where information was dispersed along with contacting various officials. It often took multiple phone calls, emails and questions asked during press conferences to try to get clear answers from government on issues that were pressing to northerners. It took days and weeks before the territory recalled workers, got back up and running and worked on supports for evacuees. 

We fielded hundreds of messages from residents everyday who, in the absence of direction and support from governments and with nowhere else to turn, came to us with their questions and concerns. We dealt with everything from people wondering what was happening to their mail to people trying to find where their loved one in hospital had been transported. 

All this while we were unable to share information on Facebook due to Meta’s block on news in Canada. Meanwhile misinformation and disinformation were running rampant. 

Worst to me was the apathy that I encountered. 

One incident particularly sticks with me. A woman messaged Cabin Radio looking for help, saying she was being kicked out of her hotel room because the establishment had not been notified the evacuation order had been extended, she couldn’t afford to pay for a room on her own, the nearby evacuation centre had closed and she didn’t have transportation to get to the next closest centre. When I asked the N.W.T. government what she should do during one of the nightly press conferences, a representative said the evacuation order had been extended and insisted everything should be fine. There was no interest in following up or trying to help this woman so I was left trying to help her on my own. 

This was not the only such incident where officials seemed disinterested in the challenges residents were facing. I still wonder why I cared so much while some territorial officials, whose job it was to address these issues and were paid well to do so, seemed to not care at all. 

They certainly didn’t appear to care about my wellbeing, or that of my co-workers, as we spread ourselves incredibly thin. That was apparent to me when the health and social services department responded to the Yellowknife Women’s Society’s request for help with a link to a Cabin Radio article. Not only was that an unacceptable response to the need to support vulnerable people, I feel the government shirked their duties and relied on a small, independent team of reporters with no regard for the impact that would have. 

When I asked officials what mental health supports would be available to evacuees upon their return, I was told there would be no additional supports. As many people know, mental health resources in the North are inadequate even at the best of times. Yet it seems the N.W.T. government knew help was needed. When I went to an appointment at Yellowknife Primary Care shortly after returning home, I saw a poster in the waiting room acknowledging we had all been through “a traumatic event” and displayed contact information for several counsellors who were available. It felt like a slap in the face when I read further and the poster said those supports were only for N.W.T. government employees. 

All this had a profound impact on my mental health, something I am still struggling with. Earlier this spring, everything hit me all at once and I had a severe depressive episode where I could barely function. And I am still incredibly angry. It has me questioning whether I can stay in the North or continue to be a reporter. 

As a journalist, I was also disappointed with how national media covered the evacuation. 

National coverage of the North often leaves much to desire with many outlets ignoring the region altogether or reducing it to stories that are either little more than tragedy porn or fluff pieces. Yet there are stories here that are important for all Canadians to hear and people whose stories deserve to be told. The North is on the frontlines of the climate crisis, it is at the forefront of Indigenous rights and Arctic security, and northerners have been facing cost of living challenges, as well as housing and healthcare crises for decades. People here are also residents of Canada and deserve to have the same attention and service as people living elsewhere. 

Because of this knowledge gap, many national outlets struggled to understand simple facts about the North during the evacuation and their reporting suffered for it. One outlet mistakenly called Yellowknife “Yellowstone.” Another falsely reported a date they believed Yellowknife’s evacuation order would lift, not understanding that under territorial legislation, states of emergency automatically expire every two weeks unless extended. Some outlets even put themselves and others at risk, added stress during an emergency and took away resources from evacuees, while traveling unprepared into Yellowknife as thousands of residents were trying to get out. 

By turning their attention to the North only when Yellowknife is evacuated, and not when many other communities were evacuated, some more than once, many outlets also deepened the divide between the capital and other communities, and caused a lot of hurt. Just recently publishing one story related to the anniversary of Yellowknife’s evacuation elicited angry comments on Facebook from residents who still feel hurt, and I can’t say I wouldn’t feel the same if I was in their shoes.

Similar to the N.W.T. government, national media also relied heavily on us. We received dozens of interview requests and questions. While it was sometimes flattering and we were often happy to help and wanted other outlets to get things right, it was also exhausting. And not everyone who reached out to us was respectful or treated us like we were human beings. It makes me concerned for how other evacuees may have been treated. 

Many national news outlets were shocked when then Premier Caroline Cochrane spoke about the North’s infrastructure gap during the evacuation, a reality northerners live with everyday. It was only after APTN and CBC released a joint investigation on concerns with Nutrition North, a subsidy intended to address the high cost of food in the North, that those long-held concerns were raised in the House of Commons. I can’t help but feel that if national coverage of the North were more equitable, it would put pressure on governments to address long-standing issues in the region that have been neglected for decades. 

So where do we go from here?

There are good things that we can take away from last summer. We saw the kindness of northerners and other Canadians who came together to support people in a time of need — from offering free meals to organizing jam nights. There were several public servants who did countless hours of work because they cared. Cabin Radio also received, and continues to receive, many kind messages of thanks for our work, which is incredibly rare in journalism.

When it comes to where things went poorly, last summer should be a wake up call. The science is clear. From all the evidence that we have, severe wildfires and other climate disasters are expected to become more common and will only increase in severity.

So far I have seen little positive change and I find it difficult to be optimistic.

There are still many unanswered questions and no official has ever apologized or taken accountability for the inadequate planning and supports. Instead, we were told that the evacuation was successful because 19,000 people were evacuated and no one died. Not only is that not true (a patient died while waiting to be evacuated from the hospital) it’s an insult to the many residents who faced unnecessary challenges and frankly I think the bar needs to be higher.   

KPMG has released its review of how Yellowknife handled last year’s evacuation and the city has already been working to better prepare for future emergencies including putting together an evacuation plan. But municipalities have limited funding and often can’t manage all the responsibilities being downloaded onto them. There also continues to be communication challenges and confusion about the responsibilities between various levels of government.

One year later, and the territorial government’s emergency management review has just begun. As the months wear on, I worry about people’s memories and whether they will want to participate in the review. The premier has also said the assessment won’t point fingers or hold anyone accountable. While I have no interest in scapegoating and believe there are systemic issues at play, I am concerned that’s not the right approach. I do think that if there are people in the public service who are not meeting their job requirements, the N.W.T. government should be aware of that and are obliged to take action by ensuring staff and leaders are properly trained and fulfilling their roles. 

It is not too late. Changes must be made. 

Governments need to learn to better prepare for future emergencies and consider the needs of everyone including people with disabilities, elders and people with addiction and mental health issues, among other vulnerable groups. They need to be prepared to partner with other organizations to offer emergency supports, including mental health services and housing. They need to learn to communicate effectively, connect with the realities people are facing on the ground, and provide people the information they need when they need it. Different levels of government need to work together and communicate with each other. 

Media outlets also need to do a better job of representing the North, learn more about the region, develop relationships with northerns and make sure they are reporting in respectful ways that are accurate and don’t put people at risk. 

People also need to learn to be kinder, more empathetic and more careful about what they say and share online. Misinformation, even when shared with the best intentions, can cause harm. 

It’s critical that governments figure all this out, and fast. The climate crisis is only getting worse, and that means dealing with a country that is increasingly on fire.