Ontario Premier Doug Ford traveled through the province’s north on Friday as crews battled a wildfire season already outpacing recent years, and Indigenous leaders pressed governments for a faster, better-coordinated response to communities under threat.
Speaking at a news conference in Thunder Bay, Ford said search-and-rescue teams had launched roughly 40 separate missions to reach some 300 people mostly campers and others outside community boundaries stranded by the advancing flames.
His visit came just days after the Chiefs of Ontario put out a public statement urging Ottawa and Queen’s Park to work together on emergency support for northern First Nations facing fire threats. According to that statement, chiefs meeting to plan possible states of emergency and evacuations voiced frustration over the red tape involved in requesting help, along with confusion about how officials are supposed to be notified when a state of emergency is declared.
Four First Nations Namaygoosisagagun (also known as Collins), Whitesand, Lac des Mille Lacs, and Gakijiwanong Anishinaabe Nation were placed under mandatory evacuation orders as fire closed in.
One Collins resident described the scramble to escape, saying there was only enough time to grab a bag and rush to the shoreline before boats pulled away leaving mere minutes before the community was overtaken.
Ford told reporters the province was contending with 191 active wildfires, 73 of them still burning out of control. He credited the Ontario Provincial Police and allied rescue crews including Indigenous police services and Thunder Bay police, who are assisting with evacuation logistics for their work on the ground.
Provincial figures show 532 wildfires have broken out across Ontario so far this year, a sharp jump from the 362 recorded over the same stretch in 2025 and well above the 333-fire average of the past decade.
To support the firefighting push, Ford said the province currently has about 155 fire crews deployed alongside roughly 80 water bombers and helicopters, with another 40 aircraft on standby to move wherever they’re needed most.
He had a blunt message for anyone tempted to check on their property: stay away. Returning to homes or campsites, he warned, risks lives and can actually stop aerial crews from dropping water, since pilots are instructed to hold off if unauthorized people are spotted in a target zone.
Ten communities had been fully evacuated as of Friday morning, Ford said, with three more either preparing to evacuate or under an active warning. He outlined the evacuation logistics: smaller Dash 8 aircraft ferry evacuees about 35 at a time out of remote communities to Thunder Bay, where they’re transferred onto larger planes bound for Toronto, Niagara Falls, and other host cities. The province has pledged to cover housing and meals for everyone displaced.
Ontario’s Natural Resources Minister, Mike Harris, faced pointed questions about the province’s response, including why Whitesand First Nation reportedly received no provincial assistance while trying to safeguard its own infrastructure. Harris acknowledged that resources are stretched thin, with crews committed not only in the northwest but across the northeast as well, and said the province continues to coordinate with First Nations communities and federal partners.
On why Collins wasn’t warned earlier, Harris explained that the fire ignited only about 15 kilometres from the community and, driven by weather conditions at the time, advanced toward it at roughly 4 to 8 kilometres an hour a pace he said left little room for advance notice. He noted the community’s decision to evacuate on its own was the right call, calling self-evacuation the recommended course of action when a fire moves in that fast.
Patty Hajdu, the federal minister overseeing the Federal Economic Development Agency for Northern Ontario, addressed the financial strain facing communities that have taken in evacuees from elsewhere. She assured host First Nations that their costs would be reimbursed, with her department working directly with each community to sort out the details. She also encouraged First Nations leadership to hold onto receipts and records of spending now, so that the eventual reconciliation of costs goes as smoothly as possible.
With hundreds of fires still burning and more communities bracing for possible evacuation orders, officials signaled the response effort and the scrutiny of it is far from over.
