Photo Credit: Salvationarmy.ca

By Shane Clausing

Salvation Amy Grande Prairie

Grande Prairie Salvation Army helps Fort Vermilion during evacuation

May 22, 2020 | 5:30 AM

In late April, the town of Fort Vermillion was forced to evacuate following major flooding in the region. The flooding caused all 750 people in the community to leave their homes and evacuate in the midst of a pandemic.

With the community only having 750 people in it there is no Salvation Army location in the town to help with relief efforts. So, the Grande Prairie Salvation Army was asked to deploy their Community Response Until to the town on May 3, so they could supply meals to the displaced residents of the town.

Captain Peter Kim with the Salvation Army in Grande Prairie says his crews were ready to respond.

“In the past couple of years we’ve been training crews to be ready for such an event and last year we went up to Paddle Prairie to help with the wild fires and the communities that were re-entering after that.”

Kim adds that on May 2 the Salvation Army received their newly renovated canteen (a food truck), so they can help the families and victims that are there. The canteen was crucial to their help.

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“It’s our way of being able to mobilize and help a community that needs food, especially because they (Fort Vermillion) are under a boil water advisory and we were able to come with a canteen that was self sustaining. We didn’t have to use any of their water and we’re still able to provide decent hot meals to both the evacuees and volunteers who were helping clean out the basements.”

The crews that are deployed from the Salvation Army in Grande Prairie are all volunteers and are usually made up of five people in each team. Each team will sub off after a week because they normally work 12-13-hour days while up there. Over the time they were there, three teams made the trip and they would serve three meals a day.

Kim says that volunteers served 4,260 meals during the three weeks that they were up there, and they provided 204 opportunities to help with disaster services and emotional and spiritual encounters.

As of Thursday, the crew began to head back to Grande Prairie as the situation was under control and life was getting back to normal. Kim adds that the canteen will be used frequently within the region.

“We’re so happy to have this new canteen to not only help the people of the Peace Region and the surrounding areas but also we’re going to use it for our Street Feeding Ministry which will be locally in Grande Prairie to help feed the homeless. It’s going to be used locally and for emergency disasters.”

Donations to the Salvation Army can be made at their website.