Thursday, May 19, 2011

Slave Lake (and Manitoba)

This map released Thursday shows the extent of the damage in Slave Lake. Red areas show where homes were destroyed; light red indicate where homes were damaged.      

   374 houses destroyed and 52 damaged, was the official word today on the out of control wildfire that devastated Slave Lake on Sunday. Officials released a map (above) showing which homes were destroyed, which ones were damaged, and which ones were ok. Luckily there wasn't as much damage as some people were predicting, and no one was killed or injured! But over 400 homes is still a lot. Keep Slave Lake in your prayers, people.

   But as new disasters come, people seem to forget the last ones. There was Indonesia (well, that was a while ago), Haiti, New Zealand, then Japan soon after, and many other disasters in between which I'm sure I've forgotten about, which in a way proves my point. Anyways, we mustn't forget Manitoba. Thousands of people were evacuated, and it is still flooding. The good news there though is that the controlled dike break (Q: Do the ends justify the means?) which was expected to impact hundreds of homes actually didn't do that much damage and apparently none of the homes in the dike break area were flooded! :D
I couldn't help thinking that we could use some of that extra Manitoba water in Slave Lake...