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Firefighters retreat as flames approac, amid the Grizzly Wildfire Complex in the East Prairie Metis Settlement, Alberta.
The North is burning
As voters were casting their ballots, firefighters were fighting dozens of wildfires across Alberta – a grim backdrop to the political debates about climate change and oil production that played out ahead of Monday’s election.
The Alberta fires — which appear to be linked to climate change — did not seem to move votes away from the firmly pro-oil United Conservative Party or toward the left-leaning New Democratic Party.
On the East Coast, where provincial leaders are raising the alarm about the financial impact of the Trudeau government’s emission-cutting policies, the woods are also on fire. In typically foggy Nova Scotia, 13 wildfires are raging, including in the suburbs of the capital Halifax, where 18,000 people have been forced from their homes. More than 200 buildings, mostly residential, have been destroyed. The province’s premier has been forced to ask Ottawa for help.
In California, where fire is such a threat that insurers are balking at issuing homeowner policies, the forests are wetter than in recent years, but forecasters still expect fires later in the season, which goes through October.