Saskatchewan is offering, but Alberta is still not asking for help to deal with the wildfire crises in Fort McMurray.
The province can provide aircraft, a landing strip in western Saskatchewan, as well as administrative and evacuation staff, said the deputy commissioner of Emergency Management, Meika Cleary.
She says the province is ready to help where it can.
“We need to ensure that we have the capacity within Saskatchewan in case an event happens. If a formal request comes we will look at that request as a whole of government and we will see what types of resources we can send to assist Alberta but ensuring that we have enough capacity in Saskatchewan to respond if necessary,” Cleary said.
She says providing additional firefighters would be difficult.
“With the state of the high risk of fires in this province that is very similar to what the risk is in Alberta we want to ensure that we do have a capacity here,” Cleary said.
Saskatchewan fire crews are prepared to take on a fire by themselves at the Alberta-Saskatchewan border, which would free up Alberta crews for other areas.
Cleary says the province could also provide additional evacuation centres, much like Alberta did last year when the province accommodated La Ronge evacuees at Cold Lake Alberta.