Natural disasters & Parks Canada's 100. anniversary

The winter has made its departure even from Edmonton. In fact the last couple of weeks have been sunny and warm (up to 20 degrees C). And it's been so dry that Alberta is fighting its first wave of forest fires. The current extend of the roughly 100 forest fires, a quarter of them out of control, is covering an area equal to the whole area destroyed by fires in the 2010. And the fire season has only started ... The community of Slave Lake, 250 km north Edmonton, will hope to see no more of it since half the town has already been flattened by fires. Meantime Manitoba is being flooded and those who still have dry feet are trying to escape too much water. The USA has seen a huge number of tornadoes; the Mississippi has reached a 500-year-flood level.  


I hate to say straight away it's all due to global warming. But no doubt the first months of this year have seen a lot of natural disaster all over the world. At a point where lots of people possibly hate the forces of nature that they have to give in to it's hard to advocate for the protection and conservation of exactly that nature. Mind you, nature has always done its thing, only human beings have never been so numerous and therefore find themselves in nature's way just about anywhere. 



Parks Canada is celebrating its 100 anniversary this weekend. But doubts are rising that Parks Canada is not true any more to its original vision of preserving the wonderful landscapes of Canada's national parks. Although visitor numbers in Canada's national parks have remained steady over the last decade, compared to a noticeable decline in US national parks, Parks Canada seems to allow more and more installations in its parks to promote "more fun activities", trying to compete with the virtual worlds that modern gadgets offer. Some of those installations and what comes along with them do in fact threaten some already endangered species even more. People who long to have those installations should find them somewhere else, outside national parks, that's my opinion. If you can't enjoy a hike without blasting music into your ears, stay in the city and walk in the park there. Obviously, Parks Canada raises money through park entrance fees which in the end help to fulfil their duties but honestly, there's no point in wanting to have everybody in for the money's matter. Where people create more damage than good they might as well be kept away. I'm almost glad some of Canada's national parks are pretty much inaccessible, especially for cars.