Wildfire devastation voted Canadian Press news story of the year
CTV
It was the year unprecedented wildfires disrupted the lives of thousands from coast to coast, shattering records for the total area burned. Canadian wildfires were by far the first choice for The Canadian Press news story of the year.
It was the year unprecedented wildfires disrupted the lives of thousands from coast to coast, shattering records for the total area burned.
Canadian wildfires -- which consumed an area roughly one-quarter the land mass of Manitoba -- were by far the first choice for The Canadian Press news story of the year, as voted by editors in newsrooms across the country.
An unusually warm and dry winter in much of Canada set the stage for a wildfire season that led to 200,000 people fleeing their homes.
One of the first communities evacuated was Evansburg, a hamlet west of Edmonton, on April 29. Evacuation orders for other communities were issued in the following days.
On May 29, Nova Scotia's fires spun out of control, in a fashion that experts said was an ominous signal for the rest of Canada. "If Halifax can burn, any place can burn, and that blows all our minds," said John Vaillant, author of the award-winning "Fire Weather: The Making of a Beast."
A heat dome and tinder-dry forests fed the blaze on the outskirts of the Nova Scotia capital. Homeowners, startled by the rapidity of the spread, encountered traffic jams attempting to flee their neighbourhoods.
On June 8, during debate in the House of Commons, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, "Canada is burning."
Alberta’s government is poised to overhaul the province’s auto insurance system, with a no-fault model emerging as the most likely, offered to counter rising premiums.
Next week, Sudbury city council will decide how to rehabilitate the College Street underpass, which was built in 1949.
A Toronto-area woman who was defrauded out of $158,000 in a roofing scam over the summer received about half her money back following a tip from a CTV News viewer.
It's official — Quebec has set a new record for the most stolen vehicles recovered in one year by Canadian border agents.
Facing criticism for requiring health care workers with two jobs within the public system to choose one to comply with labour laws, Santé Québec has announced a one-year extension to the transition period.
The consortium responsible for building Ottawa's new north-south line, TransitNext, says it is ready for the City of Ottawa to begin the final phase of approvals before opening the line to the public.
Former Saskatchewan Party MLA Greg Lawrence has been sentenced to 12 months probation – after pleading guilty to one count of assault.
Several thousand British Columbians remain in the dark Wednesday morning after a windstorm known as a bomb cyclone slammed coastal communities.
A man who plead guilty to a double stabbing in 2015 will soon be out on statutory release, but he'll have to follow some strict conditions set out by the parole board.
A school bus hit parked vehicles and pushed one into a Middle Sackville, N.S., home Wednesday afternoon.
A four-month-old baby is dead after what Toronto police are calling a “suspicious incident” at a Toronto Community Housing building in the city’s midtown area on Wednesday afternoon.