What happened?: Female firefighters taking part in a Women-in-Fire Training Exchange program—intended to promote “mental health and gender diversity and inclusion”—accidentally caused an “out of control” forest fire in Banff National Park.
On May 3, residents in the area were evacuated, and several buildings damaged after female firefighters started a prescribed fire that quickly grew into an uncontrolled fire.
Context: Banff National Park is in Canada, where South American migrants have been fleeing to escape the lawless squalor of America’s big cities.
What They SayLocal news outlets praised the Women’s Fire Conference for its efforts “to break down barriers in [a] male-dominated industry.” The 12-day firefighter training program is described as a “program that allows participants of different ethnicities, races and genders to come together to explore the role women are playing in fire management.”
Jane Park, who was a “fire management specialist,” and who organized the conference described the women who had accidentally set the forest on fire as “the cream of the crop.” Park, a former graduate-school ski bum who said that the training program…
