CORNWALL, Ontario – Cornwall will be hosting hundreds of evacuees from a northern Ontario First Nation community – again.
Flood waters have risen in Kashechewan, as the annual melt on the Albany River has created chaos in the community.
Hundreds of the community’s 1,900 residents are on their way to Cornwall and Ottawa Saturday, CBC reported.
Spokesperson Daniel Sponagle said in an interview earlier this week with Seaway News Cornwall would be on the list of shelter locations when the entire community is taken out.
The evacuees will be housed at the Nav Centre.
“When things like this happen Cornwall has always come through to help,” said Sponagle.
Kim Coe-Turner, executive director at the Nav Centre, said her facility is ready to go.
“We’re a large facility and we are turn-key,” she said. “We have been in communication with the Ontario Fire Marshal, Emergency Measures Ontario and aboriginal affairs.
“We are preparing in case of an evacuation.”
Coe-Turner added Nav Centre can move quickly when a call is made.
“It’s usually a quick turnaround,” she said.
The Nav Centre in Cornwall has been contracted by federal and provincial officials as a temporary shelter for Kashechewan evacuees the last two years.
In the past some have arrived by plane at Cornwall Regional Airport while others were flown to Ottawa and transported to the Nav Centre.
It was only a few weeks ago Fiirst Nation officials discovered that the dike protecting Kashechewan from the annual spring break up on the Albany River has been damaged.
Concern that the river could breach the town at any time has led officials to speed up the evacuation process.
This is the fourth straight year that the community has had to be evacuated.
