Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
Taralee Beardy never thought she would see her community get a safer source of water, but a national $8 billion drinking water class-action settlement affecting First Nations is set to change that. Beardy, the chief of Tataskweyak Cree Nation in northern Manitoba, says the construction of a new 40-kilometre pipeline and water treatment plant for her community is set to begin next spring, meaning Tataskweyak's six-year boil water advisory will be coming to an end.
People in the northern Manitoba city of Thompson are being told to boil their water after routine testing revealed a failure in the filtration process. The failure has allowed poorly treated water to enter the distribution system, says a notice posted May 10 by Manitoba Health. Water must be boiled for at least one minute before using it for consumption, which includes drinking, making ice, preparing food or baby formula, washing vegetables and brushing teeth, the advisory says.
Members of Norway House Cree Nation raised concerns about information sharing, environmental impacts and community employment at a consultation for a potential nickel mine in the area. Last Thursday, Flying Nickel Mining Corporation and the Government of Manitoba hosted a public consultation around the Minago Nickel Project — a possible development following a memorandum of understanding that was signed by the First Nation's chief and Flying Nickel in February. The mine could be under construction starting in 2024.
A Manitoba MLA says he wants to know why one of the busiest hospitals in northern Manitoba continues to deal with a lack of hot running water in some areas of the facility, and why the province isn’t showing more urgency and doing more to get the problem fixed. “It’s unthinkable that a large hospital like Thompson would be left without hot water for any length of time,” Flin Flon NDP MLA Tom Lindsey said last week while speaking in the Manitoba Legislature.
As southern Manitoba remains enveloped in freezing temperatures and seemingly endless snow flurries, there's another "F" word that keeps coming to mind — flooding. The province's Hydrologic Forecast Centre released its first flood outlook for the season on Friday and is predicting major flows along the Red River and its tributaries, including the Roseau, Rat and Pembina rivers.
The province of Manitoba says it hopes to improve access to timely testing of water quality samples in northern Manitoba through a pilot program announced Thursday. A bacteriological water testing in site in Thompson is expected to reduce delays and uncertainties associated with shipping water samples from the northern Indigenous communities of Pikwitonei, Thicket Portage and Nelson House, according to a provincial news release.
