She fled the wildfires with her kids. But her husband stayed behind to fight them
Kayla McKennitt says it's been hard to stay in touch with her firefighter husband
Kayla McKennitt says she's had good days and bad since she took her kids and dogs to flee the wildfires threatening their home in Fox Creek, Alta., earlier this month.
Her husband, firefighter Chris McKennitt, stayed behind to tackle the blaze, and it's been hard to keep in touch.
"He's out of cell service and then when I do talk to him, it's very, very quick," said McKennitt, who is staying in an RV on her sister's driveway in Stony Plain, just west of Edmonton.
"[It's] him telling me that the fire is coming to town and he doesn't have time to talk and he loves me and he'll call me later," she told The Current's Matt Galloway.
"That's a bad day."
Out-of-control wildfires prompted Alberta to declare a state of emergency on May 6, with officials now warning that the fight against the fires could drag on all summer. As of Wednesday afternoon, more than 90 fires are burning, with thousands of people displaced.
Kayla said Chris has been delegating crews to tackle the fires around their town, but he doesn't go into specifics when they talk, and tries to focus on the positives.
She's heard that the nearest fire is getting bigger, and closer to their town. It's already reached Iosegun Lake, about 10 kilometres north of Fox Creek.
"We take our family camping a lot, and it's a special place for us," she said.
"It's pretty devastating to know that it might not be there when we return."
Kids miss their dad
Kayla knows her husband will be as safe as he possibly can, but she worries about the danger he's in.
"They're trying to chase the fire, but it's so smoky that they can't see much, right? So anything can happen," she said.
She said her kids are missing home, and missing their dad — but it's helping to be at her sister's place, with family.
"We're trying to keep it as normal as we can.… You don't want to worry them too much," she said.
When they evacuated, her kids took along some things that were important to them. "They do know what's going on but only to an extent," Kayla said.
For now, she's trying to avoid stress and look after her family.
"We've just got to pray that the wind doesn't push it too far into town and that [the] defences that they set up hopefully will hold," she said.
"We just got to, you know, keep faith. That's all you can do."
Audio produced by Julie Crysler and Brianna Gosse.
