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Last week, I accompanied the Canadian Red Cross outreach team as they were visiting First Nation communities affected by the BC Wildfires and was reminded that no community or individual is too far to be reached. 

Local firefighters Lara and Tristan had just moved to the area before their wedding this Saturday. When the fires literally hit them close to home they got to work. 

Red Cross volunteer Jack McCaskill recently helped respond to the wildfires in British Columbia. He took a moment to share his experiences as a front line volunteer, responding to a disaster. 

She sits cross legged on the cot, amid the many other mothers in the crowded tent. She has a smile that can light up a room. She uses it to bravely mask her concern. Two of her three children have fallen sick to bacteria ravaging many villages across eastern Africa. Acute watery diarrhea/cholera has taken its toll on the bodies of six-month-old Abdi who lies in his mother’s lap, and on six-year-old Zakaria, who curls up lethargically at the foot of the cot, barely able to lift his head.

​Electric shock drowning is relatively new given the rise of power-driven docks in recent decades but its consequences can be severe; it’s important to consider safety when around water and electricity. Electric shock could happen when electric current leaks into the surrounding body of water, causing the water to become energized.

For Ross Pratt it was an easy decision to leave Regina and volunteer with the Canadian Red Cross as the organization supports evacuees from the B.C. wildfires.

Volunteerism is in his blood.

Planning to go to the beach this summer? If you happen to cross paths with an angry jellyfish and you get stung, please know that there is no need to embarrass yourself by asking a friend to pee on your wound. 

I have always loved summer thunderstorms, even when the house shakes after a violent thunderclap. But when you live in the woods, power outages caused by violent thunderstorms are quite common.