Startling video shows first moments of the south Jasper wildfire
“There was a point where I slowed down and could feel the heat from the fire on the window”
New video appears to show the moments immediately after one of the wildfires in Jasper National Park began.
Delia Mo and Enoch Leisure, American travellers en route home from a recent trip to Alaska, were driving south on Highway 93 the evening of July 22.
In an interview with The Weather Network, the duo explained how a storm “came out of nowhere,” and how they witnessed a cloud-to-ground lightning strike not far south from where they were driving.
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About five minutes later, they came upon a wildfire “100 metres” from the road to the east.
Startling videos of the encounter show an already-intense and growing wildfire with flames shooting above the trees. It’s time stamped to just after 7 p.m. on July 22, and geo-tagged to about 27 km south of the Jasper townsite.
(Courtesy of Delia Mo and Enoch Leisure)
In a prescient moment, Leisure can be heard speculating during one of the videos that Highway 93 will soon be closed, along with the national park.
“The storm front hit, kind of at that point, and that wind was going at least 50 miles an hour (80 km/h) up the canyon,” he recalled to The Weather Network on August 1.
“Once it hit the fire, that’s when we were like ‘let’s keep going’ because it was growing exponentially at that point.”
The couple explained how they contacted Parks officials as soon as they had adequate service, and continued south away from the blaze.
A Parks Canada staff member said Thursday the organization hadn’t reviewed the video.
A recap of the initial fire response given by a Parks official during a July 23 press conference aligns with the experience.
Parks Canada Incident Commander Katie Ellsworth explained that at “approximately 7 p.m.”, she received the initial report of a wildfire north of the Jasper townsite. (The wildfires around Jasper have since been operationally grouped into the “Jasper wildfire complex”.) While her team was investigating that fire, reports of wildfire south of the townsite began to roll in.
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“Approximately 30 minutes thereafter we received a report of a wildfire near Kerkeslin campground. Within ten minutes we heard another report of fire in the Leach Lake area,” Ellsworth explained.
Kerkeslin campground is under three kilometres from where Mo and Leisure's video is geotagged.
“The situation unfolded very, very quickly. The winds were gusting upwards of 20 to 30 kilometres an hour in Jasper, and it was hot. It was 30-plus degrees celsius with 20 per cent humidity maximum,” Ellsworth added.
Ellsworth said the fires south of the townsite were assessed by a crew and helicopter and by 8 p.m an evacuation alert was issued for the townsite. An evacuation order, which affected an estimated 20,000 to 25,000 residents, workers and tourists in the National Park, was issued about two hours after that.
A Parks Canada photo shows devastation along Cabin Creek Drive in the Jasper townsite. (Parks Canada)
“These fires were exhibiting aggressive, aggressive fire behaviour,” Ellsworth said on July 23.
Two days later, what officials have described as a wall of flame more than 100 metres high covered the final kilometres towards the townsite from the south in just hours.
Mo and Leisure, who first posted video of their encounter on their social channel moleisurexventures, are avid travellers who visited 59 of 63 US national parks on a recent multi-year road trip.
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They say that while they have come close to wildfire before, none of their experiences quite compare to the immediate intensity of what they witnessed in Jasper.
“There was a point where I slowed down and could feel the heat from the fire on the window,” Enoch said.
After seeing the initial lightning strike, Mo also recorded a time lapse on her phone, which shows smoke begin to billow above the trees. (Delia Mo and Enoch Leisure)
Safely home in Nebraska, they offered words of support for all impacted by the fire, which still burns out of control and has now been confirmed to have destroyed approximately 30 per cent of the townsite.
“I want to thank the firefighters and first responders, and anyone who went into this situation, risking their lives to help someone out. And I want to say sorry to all the people affected,” said Mo, who added she and Enoch had a chance to explore the “beautiful” town before the fire struck.
“I know the recovery is going to be very hard, but I’m sure the community, and the country, they’re all going to be behind them, supporting them and helping them get back on their feet,” Leisure added.
Both the government of Alberta and the government of Canada have pledged to match donations to the Canadian Red Cross. The Jasper Community Team Society is accepting donations as well.
