By Ed White
WINNIPEG, Manitoba (Reuters) - Manitoba declared a state of emergency and urged thousands of people in northern and eastern parts of the province to evacuate on Wednesday, as wildfires spread in Central and Western Canada.
Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew said at a news conference that 17,000 people needed to move quickly, including from the city of Flin Flon. Many will be put up at soccer fields and community centers in Winnipeg and other cities, and federal armed forces will be arriving to help transport evacuees, he said.
"This is the largest evacuation in many Manitobans’ living memory, and this will require significant resources and co-operation from all levels of government, Kinew said in a statement.
Separately, wildfires in Alberta province have prompted a temporary shutdown of some oil and gas production and forced residents of at least one small town to evacuate.
Oil producer Cenovus Energy said it was scaling back nonessential workers at its Foster Creek facility in response to the wildfires in northern Alberta.
Cenovus' Foster Creek operation is among a number of oil sands facilities operated by companies with assets in the Bonnyville-Cold Lake region.
That region was affected on Wednesday by wildfires spanning 2,900 hectares (11.2 square miles) near Chipewyan Lake, a small community in the northern part of the province, approximately 130 km (81 miles) west of the oil sands hub of Fort McMurray.
Cenovus said it was closely monitoring the evolving wildfire situation, and the staffing measure was a precaution.
Alberta government officials said on Wednesday there was no current threat to Chipewyan Lake, but residents have been placed on a one-hour evacuation notice as winds could shift.
Another blaze, nearly 1,600 hectares in size, is burning out of control about 7 km north of Swan Hills, also in the province's north.
The approximately 1,200 residents of Swan Hills were ordered to evacuate on Monday evening. One oil and gas producer in that area, Aspenleaf Energy, said on Monday it had temporarily halted operations as a precaution and shut in approximately 4,000 barrels per day of oil equivalent production.
(Reporting by Amanda Stephenson in Calgary and Pooja Menon in Bengaluru; Writing by Caroline Stauffer; Editing by Mohammed Safi Shamsi, Sonali Paul and Tom Hogue)
