Task force to assist Whelan Bay, Creighton, and Denare Beach evacuees returning after wildfires

Many of Saskatchewan’s remaining wildfire evacuees are just days away from going home, but some won’t be returning to a physical structure.

The province’s wildfire season is only about halfway through, but Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency (SPSA) Vice-President Steve Roberts said on Friday that 299 homes and 60 cabins have been lost thus far.

Read more:

• New water bomber hasn’t flown since arriving in Saskatchewan
• ‘Tornado outbreak’: Environment Canada looking into eight ‘likely’ tornadoes in Sask.
• ‘It’s absolutely disgusting’: ALS Society, NDP call for investigation into Moose Jaw clinic

Community members from Whelan Bay were expected to begin returning on Friday according to Roberts.

He said he also anticipated that Creighton and Denare Beach evacuees would be able to return starting on Sunday.

Although Roberts said the community impact has been managed and “extremely low on some of these fires,” that’s not the case for all of them, including Denare Beach.

The community faced significant losses and many homeowners will need to contact insurance agencies, according to Roberts.

He said the provincial government’s Recovery Task Force will lead the efforts on getting impacted communities back up and running, working with people who have lost everything.

“As you can imagine, you can’t have 229 people all independently trying to talk to the town about getting their service and their power hooked up on the same day,” Roberts said.

The task force, announced on Thursday, includes representatives from the Ministries of Health, Social Services, Government Relations and others, and is intended to help with these types of issues.

“Some of them may be very unique to a house or to a property, and some of them will be very common to almost every structure that was impacted, whether it was fully burnt or just partially burnt,” Roberts said.

Part of the task force’s responsibilities will include conducting assessments with community leaders to determine the needs and how to address them through a coordinated effort.

According to SPSA President Marlo Pritchard some communities will need temporary or permanent shelters while they’re being rebuilt.

Active fires in the province on June 20, 2025. (Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency)

Fires in Saskatchewan on June 20

As of 3 p.m. on Friday, 19 active fires were burning in Saskatchewan.

Five of those blazes were not contained, with another nine under ongoing assessment and firefighters were protecting values in two. Three fires were considered contained.

Contained means suppression action is taking place and the fire is not expected to grow in size, ongoing assessment means the fire is being monitored regularly to assess risk to values in the area and not contained means suppression action is taking place but the fire is expected to grow in size, according to SPSA. Protecting values means a fire is active and action is focused on protecting things like cabins and infrastructure.

There isn’t a provincial fire ban, but 79 rural municipalities, 33 urban municipalities, and 11 provincial parks in the province still have active bans. The fire danger ranges across the province, with the north under moderate to high fire danger and the south mostly between low to high fire danger.

There have been 265 fires in Saskatchewan in 2025. The five-year average to date is 159.

— with files from CKOM News

Read more:

• New water bomber hasn’t flown since arriving in Saskatchewan
• ‘Tornado outbreak’: Environment Canada looking into eight ‘likely’ tornadoes in Sask.
• ‘It’s absolutely disgusting’: ALS Society, NDP call for investigation into Moose Jaw clinic