Jasper officials to provide closer look at wildfire damage

A high-resolution map released Saturday showed the extent of the damage to the Jasper townsite, with more than 300 buildings completely destroyed.

Emergency officials are expected to bring in members of the media Sunday afternoon for the first tour of the townsite inside Jasper National Park since it was ravaged by a wildfire, with the tour to give a closer look at the extent of the damage.

Reporters will journey through the community and view both critical infrastructure that remains intact, as well as being able to see the structures destroyed by the flames.

The tour comes a day after the municipality of Jasper released a high-resolution map and list of properties showing which structures had been destroyed since the fire entered the townsite. Single-family homes, apartments, a hostel, a senior’s manor and a church were among the buildings destroyed.

Approximately 30 per cent of the buildings in Jasper are estimated to have been damaged by the wildfires, amounting to 358 of the town’s 1,113 structures destroyed.

“Most structures were destroyed and very few were damaged,” Christine Nadon, incident commander for the Municipality of Jasper, said in an update alongside Parks Canada officials on Saturday.

As of Saturday evening, the wildfire remained out of control with expectations it could become more active in the coming days with warmer weather forecasted.

“Currently we are going to be working on this wildfire we expect over the next three months at least,” Landon Shephard, deputy incident commander with Parks Canada, said Saturday. “We are gearing up for a long struggle.

Nadon added that it had become an all-or-nothing situation as buildings were either not affected at all or completely razed to the ground.