KAMLOOPS THIS WEEK THURSDAY
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MAY 5, 2016 | Volume 29 No. 54
TODAY’S WEATHER Sun and clouds High 20 C Low 8 C
TAGGING A WORLD RECORD?
ENDURING DOG DAYS ON DIAMOND
Laser tag mark to be attempted
Kamloops RiverDogs’ midgets seeking a win
A13
A17
Council delays final decision on Ajax mine ANDREA KLASSEN
STAFF REPORTER
andrea@kamloopsthisweek.com
Kamloops city council will put its final deliberations on the proposed Ajax mine on hold as proponent KGHM seeks more time to answer questions from a city-hired consultant and members of the public. KGHM spokesman Robert Koopmans told KTW the mining company is working with the B.C. Environmental NOT TOO Assessment Office on a IMPRESSED: longer response timeline, B.C.’s grand chief thus in part because its confar not liking what he is sultants are tied up in an ongoing First Nations hearing from KGHM panel review of the projDAMNING ect. REPORT: Kamloops council Auditor general slams was scheduled to have its ministries’ compliance final debate on the proand enforcement work posed copper and gold mine next Monday PAGES A6/A7 (May 9), but public works director Jen Fretz said the city’s reviewer, SLR Consulting, has little new information since its first report to council in March. “Very little has changed and very little has come back,” Fretz said. During its public presentations earlier this year, SLR said it was unable to verify many of KGHM’s claims about impacts on air, water, human health and other issues.
MORE ON MINING
See COUNCIL, A6
PHOTO VIA INSTAGRAM 9PETER_NDP)
All 80,000 residents of the northern Alberta city of Fort McMurray have been ordered to evacuate due to a raging wildfire.
WITNESSES TO FORT MAC INFERNO [video online]
CAM FORTEMS
STAFF REPORTER
See footage at kamloopsthisweek.com
cam@kamloopsthisweek.com
When Brenda Prevost’s daughter and son-in-law left their house in Fort McMurray Tuesday morning — leaving their son with a babysitter — the nearby wildfire didn’t seem an immediate threat. Within hours, however, her daughter, Melissa, was fleeing the Suncor Energy plant an hour away to get back to Fort McMurray after officials called for the evacuation of the northern Alberta city of 80,000. While the family is safe, Prevost said they are under no illusions about the fate of
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their house in the Abasand area of Fort McMurray. The executive director of Centre for Seniors Information in Kamloops spent the night communicating with her family. “She sent me video of the subdivision when they’re going down the highway and it’s a wall of fire . . . We’re quite sure there’s nothing there.” Because the couple was at work on
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Tuesday, they had no opportunity to get anything out of the home they have lived in for about eight years. The babysitter and Prevost’s grandson were moved to an evacuation centre, where the toddler was later reunited with his mother. At a camp about an hour north of Fort McMurray, Kamloops resident Ryan Saucier spent the night sleeping on the floor to make room for a few of the tens of thousands of people evacuated from the city. The electrician is staying at McClelland Lake, which has rooms for about 2,000 people. See FIRE CHIEF, A5
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