Thursday July 17, 2025 All This Smoke.

 

   Looking outdoors the early morning of July 12, 2025, I saw what I would normally recognize as morning mist as in the image above from 30-years ago along Mikinaak Creek, then remember, "No, it's Manitoba wildfire smoke, the new normal of our lives in Palmville Township Minnesota." 

 

   According to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center, as of July 9th, 2025 fires had charred 4.8 million hectares (11, 861,058.31 acres). Manitoba accounted for about 247,1053.81 acres of burned area, about 20-times more than at the same point in 2024 and 13-times more than the 25-year average. 

 

    Several communities and more than 10,000 people were under mandatory evacuation orders, according to officials. Among them were Snow Lake, Garden Hill, Lynn Lake, Leaf Rapids, Split Lake, and Pukatawagan. According to news reports, several homes were destroyed in Split Lake, also called Tataskweyak, a Cree Nation community in northern Manitoba.

   Who would've imagined we'd have to endure months of wild fire smoke, beginning in mid-May, from Canada that would duly threaten those of us with respiratory problems as elders or children and encourage us to stay within our homes; or wear masks outdoors this time being against something we can see or smell within our homes. One of our four in-house air cleaners registers a moderate air quality index number of '52,' when it's usually around 6; further prompting us to seal off poor sealing windows and outer doors as if against subzero temperatures.

 

   Talk about smoke.

 

    According to CBC News, July 11, 2025, a letter signed by six Republican House of Representatives of Minnesota and Wisconsin was published Monday July 7th, 2025 and addressed to Canada's ambassador in Washington: "... taking issue with Canadian wildfire smoke traveling south which they said was making it difficult for some Americans to enjoy their summer."

 

   Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew is quoted to have said, "I've shaken the hands of American firefighters in northern Manitoba who are helping us out. I would challenge these ambulance chasers in the U.S. congress to go and do the same [and] hear how much the American firefighting heroes who are here ... love our province."  

 

An effect of wildfires all across rural Manitoba.

    How could our elected officials trivialize wildfires all across Manitoba to whine about Canadian wildfire smoke affecting us when you can see and smell the impossible of their daily existence in 'hell' across the landscape and the forced evacuation of thousands of Canadians from their homes (and several deaths) in areas quite similar to those in Minnesota and Wisconsin. It's true we hate the smoke, but we don't blame the Canadians for it!

 

    Mother Jones wrote a good piece about it; better than I could come up with in the moment.