Four service members died in a “violent, fast-moving” fire that swept through a Canadian military base in Alberta on Saturday, and dozens more were seriously injured, Canadian prime minister Mark Carney said.
Carney called the incident at Canadian Forces Base Wainwright one of the worst tragedies for the country’s military on domestic soil during peacetime. He said he asked senior officials on the ground to provide a detailed account and formal briefing later Sunday.
Canada’s military said Sunday that at this time, “there are no indications that it was the result of any terrorist activity.” The incident remains under investigation, it said.
Wainwright is one of Canada’s busiest army bases and is used to train soldiers for military operations.
The base “is where the women and men of our armed forces learn to do the hardest things this country can ask of anyone,” Carney said. “Those we lost, those who were injured were training to defend Canada, to serve Canada. And now Canada serves them.”
Carney said military and civilian crews fought the fire throughout the night “in some of the worst conditions imaginable.”
Defense Minister David McGuinty said he “cannot recall an incident like this in recent memory” but at a news conference did not say what caused the fire.
“This is a profoundly difficult moment for the entire Canadian Armed Forces,” Gen. Jennie Carignan, chief of the defense staff, said in a statement Sunday.
A doctor in Edmonton, Alberta’s capital, told Canada’s national public broadcaster, the CBC, that hospitals in Wainwright were “completely overwhelmed” by the number of patients needing care.
“It is more patients than any of us want to count right now. It’s a disaster. It’s a 1-in-every-15-to-25-year disaster,” said Warren Thirsk, an emergency department physician at the Royal Alexandra Hospital.
Wainwright Mayor Bruce Pugh told CBC that the incident “would be the largest mass-casualty event that we’ve seen.”
Carney earlier said in a statement on X that a “serious incident” created a major fire at the base. “Our thoughts are with all the brave women and men affected,” he said.
He said Sunday the Canadian flag will fly at half-mast on federal buildings across Canada.
The fire started in a training area of the base around 4 p.m. Saturday and “spread rapidly” beyond its boundaries, Canada’s Defense Department said in a statement.
“As emergency responders continue their work and the situation continues to evolve, the full extent of the impact remains under assessment,” the department’s statement read.
The Municipal District of Wainwright said Sunday that the fire is “being held” but that authorities were monitoring the area. It asked local residents to avoid the scene and to keep roads clear for emergency personnel.
Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the chair of NATO’s military committee, shared condolences in an online statement: “Wainwright is where Canadian soldiers, and so many Allies with them, train for the hardest tasks of our profession. Those who fell there served our common security, and the Military Committee will honour their memory.”
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