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After floods and fires, Canadians take shelter in British Columbia church center: NPR

Lytton, British Columbia, set a new Canadian heat record before being ravaged by a wildfire this summer.

Cole Burston / AFP via Getty Images


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Cole Burston / AFP via Getty Images

HOPE, British Columbia – A little before dinner time, people flocked to sit by the fire in the main lodge of Camp Hope, a church retreat center in the foothills of this western Canadian province.

In late June, they recounted, a wildfire suddenly hit their town of Lytton, British Columbia, about 60 miles north.

“It was just a big cloud like a brown smoke climbing up the mountainside there,” recalls Alphonse Adams, of the first Lytton Indigenous Peoples.

“Then I guess the wind picked up there, plus the heat, and started reaching the village there,” he said. “I don’t call it a town. It was a village. Now, it’s not.”

British Columbia has experienced a series of natural disasters this year, which scientists say show the increasingly severe impact of climate change on everything from wildfires to heat waves to landslides .

This summer, a heat dome broke Canada’s temperature record and blame hundreds of deaths. Last month, an “atmospheric river”, a stream of warm, humid air from the tropics, reduced a significant amount of the normal month’s rainfall across the southern part of the province in just two days. Record rainfall caused widespread flooding and landslides.

Canadians who experienced these extreme weather events passed Camp Hope, starting with Lyttonites, the town that burned just days after setting an all-time temperature record for Canada during the summer of this year. Now, up to 121 degrees. Two people died in the fire.

It was a long period of homelessness

David Crozier walks past a pile of donated supplies at Camp Hope after rainstorms caused flooding and landslides that cut the highway through British Columbia, in Hope, Canada on November 19, Crozier and his wife Doreen were lived at Camp Hope for months since fleeing the wildfire that devastated the town of Lytton, British Columbia.

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Jesse Winter / Reuters

Dave and Doreen Crozier retired to Lytton 15 years ago. The fire reached their home shortly after Doreen ran back inside to try to get her wallet and passport.

“Fortunately,” said Dave Crozier, “I saw her rush out with a cat in the basket and it was too late to take our other possessions. The fire engulfed the house at that time. “

The Croziers stayed with each of their children for several weeks, before they learned Camp Hope, run by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, had canceled summer reservations for residents of Lytton. Some have since moved to other temporary accommodation closer to friends or family. The Croziers continued, with their cat.

“The only thing I’m out of the house. I’m keeping her,” Doreen Crozier joked.

“Besides,” said her husband, “it’s a long time to be homeless.”

A new crisis is on their doorstep

Camp Hope, he said, “has been a great rescue in the dark,” and not just for the residents of Lytton.

Wildfire displaced people recently found themselves helping tourists stranded overnight on a highway that runs through the camp, after torrential downpours triggered multiple landslides.

In the morning, Croziers and a camp staff member broke down the car windows and invited the passengers in to eat and warm their stomachs.

Wildfire trees on the outskirts of Lytton, British Columbia.

Cole Burston / AFP via Getty Images


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Cole Burston / AFP via Getty Images

“You can see the tension on the faces of people who’ve slept with their kids out there on the road on Highway 7 all night,” said Dave Crozier. “It’s scary to see them in that condition.”

One of the drivers, Samantha Brownlee, said she didn’t realize how many people were stranded until she entered the motel. On the way home with her parents, she had just spent a cold night in the car with her children, aged 7 and almost 2 years old.

“This wonderful person, named Karen, just saw me in the middle of this dining room, and I was getting Cheerios for the boys. And she said, ‘Do you need diapers?’ And I think my eyes must have grown like three sizes,” Brownlee said.

A transformation has prepared the camp for its newest guests

Camp Hope has undergone a number of changes since the arrival of the Lyttonites. Volunteers now prepare three meals a day. The camp has a room filled with toiletries and donated clothes, which they donate to stranded visitors.

“We just sat down on a bench,” Brownlee said. She quickly realized that some of the people around her, including the woman who provided the kids with new toothbrushes, were from Lytton, and they lived in the motel. Brownlee was amazed by the abundance of supplies for hundreds of unexpected visitors.

Remains of homes and buildings destroyed by wildfire on June 30 are seen during a media tour by authorities in Lytton, British Columbia, on July 9th.

Jennifer Gauthier / Reuters


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Jennifer Gauthier / Reuters

In total, the camp welcomed 271 stranded tourists. It will take the teams several days to clear the highway.

Staff member Evie Connor said: “We set up beds in the auditorium. “We have tons of mattresses that we bring from the cabin and the furniture in the auditorium and then they find every nook and cranny – I’m still looking for mattresses in places I would never have known they would. Yes.”

With no way, the food must eventually be flown by helicopter to all the unsuspecting visitors. Connor said some temporary residents helped unload the goods and get into the kitchen.

Relatives of Brownlee, who were stranded with her children, were able to hire a helicopter to bring them out after a few days at Camp Hope. She said it was strange to go back to normal life knowing the people from Lytton would stay.

“We were lucky enough that it wasn’t a long-term change to our entire future,” she said. “I’ve spoken to the director of Camp Hope several times, to see how we can help? … What’s your plan for Christmas?”

A series of displacements after extreme weather in British Columbia

Sarah Sheffield, who was also stranded on the motorway with her husband and their dog, said that since returning home she has joined a group gathering supplies for those whose homes were flooded in a similar storm. .

“This really made me realize how much it means for someone to be going through something difficult to have people there,” she said of her experience at Camp Hope.

Volunteers and residents build a flood barrier in a low-lying area of ​​Abbotsford, British Columbia, on November 28.

Emma Jacobs for NPR


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Emma Jacobs for NPR

At least 17,000 people were ordered to evacuate last month in many cities affected by floodwaters. Some are still unable to return home.

Scientists, public officials and many residents of British Columbia have linked this summer’s heat and wildfire season and recent storms to the growing impact of climate change on our weather. area.

The fire cost tens of millions of dollars damaged at Lytton. The federal and provincial governments have pledged money to rebuild the village, but it’s slow. Currently, the remaining Lyttonites do not have a departure date from Camp Hope.

Camp Hope predicts future disaster relief role

The director of the retreat, Bill Gerber, was cut from the camp by a landslide in the nearby city of Abbotsford, which has seen massive flooding in record rains. He said he hopes the camp can return to disaster victims’ homes in the future.

Residents and volunteers created a sandbag fence to protect homes in Abbotsford threatened by further flooding, on Nov.

Emma Jacobs for NPR


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Emma Jacobs for NPR

“These super-hot, super-dry summers in BC are, in essence, just a box. We have a lot of woodland,” he noted. “Up until now, we’ve always thought of it as a blessing to have our rivers, streams, lakes and forests, our timber supply, and the rugged, natural beauty and beauty of nature. But all of a sudden, it’s like, “I don’t know, maybe it’s almost a blessing, it’s a curse for a little while, isn’t it?”

The camp just received a phone call from someone in the provincial emergency management department. Heavy rain on the road. If there were more mudslides from the saturated slopes, would they be willing to take in more visitors?

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