The northern Saskatchewan village of Pinehouse received word residents would be able to return home after a mandatory evacuation was ordered earlier this month.
An estimated 300 residents were to be transported back to Pinehouse starting on Wednesday with an unknown number of residents returning on their own means.
Karri Kemf of Saskatchewan’s social service industry told a media conference call that the estimated 300 residents are those staying in shelters.
The unknown number, she said, could not be calculated as it was unclear how many residents were staying with family or friends.
“They were very pleased to hear they would be going home,” Kemf said of a number of those utilizing the shelter upon hearing the evacuation order had been lifted for Pinehouse.
Some residents from Dillon, Grandmother’s Bay, Michel Village and Deschambault Lake were also given the green light to return home, though they were not under a mandatory evacuation order.
As of Wednesday morning, 10,460 people had been evacuated from their homes due to the forest fires raging in Saskatchewan, with 4,805 of them staying in the Prince Albert area.
