It will be a matter of weeks before residents can return to the Jasper townsite, Stephen Lacroix, managing directed of the Alberta Emergency Management Agency, said at a press conference this afternoon.
The townsite is still not safe from the fires, Lacroix said.
Once the town is safe, many conditions must be met to send residents back, he said.
“There's going to be some cleanup efforts,” he said. “Emergency services must be reestablished, water, 911 services, and the list goes on. Unfortunately, I can't offer you an exact time frame. The answer is as soon as possible, and if I was to offer a timeline, it's going to be a matter of weeks.”
It will be a “long haul” wrestling control of the wildfire in Jasper Nation Park that has grown to 36,000 hectares, said Christie Tucker, information unit manager, Alberta Wildfire.
“With the large-scale fire, it does take a long time to bring it under control and completely contain a fire, even with favourable conditions,” Tucker said.
Earlier today Parks Canada confirmed that 30 per cent of the buildings in the Jasper townsite have burned down.
Over the next few days firefighters from South Africa, Australia and New Zealand will be arriving to help with wildfires in Alberta.
The province is having discussions to potentially get aid from the Canadian Armed Forces.
Yesterday 100 firefighters arrived from Mexico. Today they are heading to High Level.
