Climate change a ‘right now’ problem

Opinion

If you want to see what climate change looks like in real time, look no further than the smouldering forests of northern Manitoba.

If you want to understand how fast a threat can turn into a crisis, ask the residents of northern communities who have been forced to flee their homes.

And if you want to know what the future holds if we continue down this path — it’s in the smoke-choked skies, the charred earth and the mass evacuation orders issued across our province this week.

For the first time in its history, the entire city of Flin Flon has been ordered to evacuate, owing to an aggressive wildfire that tore across the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border, advancing with such force that there was no time to delay.

First Nations communities — Pimicikamak and Mathias Colomb — are also under mandatory evacuation orders. The flames don’t care about borders or jurisdictions. They are consuming whatever lies in their path.

Premier Wab Kinew put it bluntly and truthfully Wednesday. “This is the largest evacuation in many Manitobans’ living memory, and this will require significant resources and co-operation from all levels of government,” he said after declaring a provincewide state of emergency.

The scale of this crisis is staggering. Thousands of people — children, elders, families — are scrambling to pack up what they can carry, leave their homes behind and pray there’s something to return to.

These aren’t just fires, they are forced displacements. They are trauma.

This fire season didn’t come out of nowhere. Manitoba (and the rest of the world) has been warming steadily for years.

Winters don’t freeze the way they used to and summers continue to set new heat records. The boreal forest that once acted as a great northern carbon sink is now drying out, weakening and, in too many cases, burning.

We’ve talked about “the new normal” when it comes to climate change, but there’s nothing normal about this. It’s not normal that the residents of a city such as Flin Flon — built around mining, industry and resilience — are now scrambling to flee for their lives.

It’s not normal that First Nations must evacuate on short notice with minimal resources, repeating a cycle of crisis and recovery that is disproportionately borne by Indigenous communities across this country.

This is the real face of climate change. Not just melting ice caps and rising sea levels, but families forced from their homes in northern Manitoba. It’s smoke warnings in Winnipeg. It’s the rising cost of fighting fires that burn longer, hotter and more unpredictably than ever.

The economic costs will be high and the emotional toll will be even higher.

The worst part? We knew this was coming. We’ve known for years. Climate scientists have been warning that these fires — bigger, faster and more devastating — would become more common.

Meanwhile, Kinew has requested help from the Canadian Armed Forces to assist with evacuations — a wise and necessary move.

The emergency response has been swift, including from the Red Cross. Manitobans, as always, are stepping up to help wherever they can. Volunteers are mobilizing and the City of Winnipeg has opened arenas as temporary shelters for evacuees.

We’ve seen before what Manitobans can do when we come together. During the 1997 flood. During the pandemic. During countless blizzards and droughts. We help each other. We rebuild.

But we need more than emergency response. We need prevention. We need investment in firefighting infrastructure, in forest management, in early warning systems.

We need to build communities that are resilient — not just in spirit, but in the concrete, structural ways that can protect people when disaster strikes.

And above all, we need a wholesale shift in how we treat climate change. It can no longer be a “future problem.” It’s a “right now” problem.

Manitoba, Canada and the world must treat this like the crisis it is. That means bold action, not polite targets.

This week, Manitoba is in crisis. But it’s a story that will play out in communities across Canada with increased intensity and danger going forward. This problem is not going away.

The smoke will eventually clear. The fire will be brought under control. But unless we change course, this won’t be the last time a Manitoba town flees in fear.

This won’t be the last time a premier pleads for federal support. This won’t be the last headline of destruction and mass evacuations.

Let Flin Flon, Pimicikamak and Mathias Colomb be the fire alarms we finally heed. Because this isn’t just Manitoba’s crisis, it’s everyone’s.

» Tom Brodbeck is a Winnipeg Free Press columnist.