There are questions about why the City of Thompson isn’t evacuating people right now, despite continued air quality advisories and an uptick in action in our northern wildfires.

On Friday’s wildfire update here on 102.9 CHTM, Mayor Colleen Smook explained why this is the case.

“Simple answer is that evacuations are an all or nothing situation. There is either a mandatory evacuation or there isn’t. We don’t want to evacuate if we don’t have too because there is a lot of planning, work and expense to make that happen.”

She said it isn’t guaranteed that hotel rooms at our destinations will be available for evacuees within the target of three days.

Having people leave their work for an extended period would also cause hardships that the city is trying to avoid.

Smook added that if we had been evacuated when the wildfire took a turn for the worse a week after its start, we would have been out of the city for over three weeks at this point, with no return in sight.

It is not until a mandatory evacuation notice is called that the Red Cross begins taking registrations for evacuees and helps cover their costs while out of the community.