Wildfires burning near Port-Cartier, Que.
, forced the evacuation of inmates from the local maximum-security prison, officials with Correctional Service Canada confirmed Sunday as favourable winds bolstered efforts to battle a pair of out-of-control blazes north of the city.
Officials with the city in the Côte-Nord region announced Friday that it had declared a state of emergency and ordered the evacuation of some 1,000 residents from three specific areas due to the fires. "The fires are still active, especially in middle of the day when it warms up, we can see big plumes, but happily the fires aren’t progressing at the moment towards the south," she told a news conference.
"The wind is with us," Alain Thibault told the news conference."But if you let citizens go home and the next day the winds shift north and the fire spreads at one kilometre per hour, that means a fire that's 11 kilometres away will be at the edge of the city in 11 hours."
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