Latest news with #Qalingo
Hamilton Spectator
20-05-2025
- Climate
- Hamilton Spectator
Puvirnituq mayor sees reason for hope as water shortage continues
Schools have closed, elders and health-centre patients have been temporarily sent south, and last week the Quebec government made an emergency delivery of 54 tonnes of water to help Puvirnituq through its ongoing water shortage crisis. A house fire Saturday destroyed two homes in Puvirnituq, as the limited amount of water hampered efforts of firefighters. (Photo by Lucy Qalingo) Mayor Lucy Qalingo hopes the community never has to go through this again. 'We are Canadians, and we have to get the same treatment as anyone else in Canada,' she told Nunatsiaq News on Tuesday. Puvirnituq's council declared a state of emergency Saturday after the water shortage hampered firefighters working to extinguish a house fire. Nine weeks ago, on March 18, the pipe that carries water from the pump at the nearby river about five kilometres to the treatment plant in town froze. A boil water advisory was issued, and since then municipal trucks have drawn untreated water directly from the river and transported it to homes and buildings in the community of about 2,100 people. Blizzard conditions have hampered efforts to deliver water. 'Our heavy equipment, like loaders and bulldozers, have been breaking down because of the amount of snow that we have been getting,' Qalingo said in a video-conference interview. 'We are overwhelmed. 'We always have those issues every year. We have normalized it.' The two schools in Puvirnituq, including Iquarsivik shown here, had to close prematurely as the water crisis prompted Kativik Ilisarniliriniq to send its teachers south. (Photo by Cedric Gallant) This year has 'made us realize that this is not normal. We are Canadians as well, we should get the same treatment as anyone else in Canada.' On May 16, the Inuulitsivik Health Centre deployed its contingency plan and relocated health-centre patients and Sailivik long-term elders facility residents, with accompanying nurses, to hospitals in Montreal. Qalingo said the community's two schools closed due to the water crisis. The school year was ended early, and school board Kativik Ilisarniliriniq sent teachers south to alleviate the burden facing water distribution in Puvirnituq. She said the community won't receive a new water pipe until the sea ice melts. The pipe has to be delivered by ship from England. During the crisis, some assistance has arrived. Receiving such support in a time like this 'has been stressful, but also amazing at the same time,' Qalingo said. Following its emergency water delivery, the Quebec government said more water will be shipped in over the coming days. Qalingo said Puvirnituq also received help from neighbouring Inukjuak, with some of its municipal staff working night shifts on the loaders and helping with water distribution. As well, families and friends from neighbouring communities offered to do Puvirnituq residents' laundry, flying it in and out of the village. And Puvirnituq itself has been distributing dry shampoo, hand sanitizer and wet towels to residents. Qalingo said she has written the Quebec government asking that the Canadian Rangers be deployed to help out. She said she sees light at the end of the tunnel — the snow is beginning to melt and the temperature is warming up. Environment and Climate Change Canada's seven-day forecast for Puvirnituq shows a high temperature of 2 C on Wednesday, going up to 11 C on Saturday and 10 C on Sunday. Municipal workers are installing a hose to act as a temporary connection between the water pump and the water treatment plant until the new pipe arrives. 'Hopefully by Sunday, we will be able to use it because it freezes too and we have to keep it warm,' she said. The Quebec government said in a news release Sunday that when the crisis ends, it will conduct an evaluation with Nunavik authorities to identify solutions to prevent it from happening again. 'This is not a time to pinpoint anyone, this is not a blaming game,' said Qalingo. 'It has to be heard at the government level, because the money we are receiving for the services to go on is not enough and it has not been enough for so many years. 'I hope that what we are going through today will not happen to our children. We always have to try to aim for a better future.'
Yahoo
18-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Fire forces Puvirnituq, Que., to declare state of emergency as water shortage continues
As people in Puvirnituq, Que., continue to struggle with a worsening water shortage, a fire has prompted the small village in Nunavik to declare a state of emergency. The fire, which began Saturday at around 3 p.m., destroyed two housing units in the village of 2,100 people. No injuries were reported but the firefighters' inability to deal with the fire quickly due to a limited supply of water is what led to a state of emergency being declared, according to Radio-Canada. Access to water has been limited since a pipe that connects the pump station to the treatment plant froze in mid-March. In recent days, patients have had to be flown south due to the limited water supply in hospitals and there have been growing concerns about sicknesses like gastroenteritis (stomach flu) spreading rapidly because of many people are unable to wash their hands. CBC News is reaching out to local authorities in order to get a better sense of what a declaration of a state of emergency entails. "I feel for our community," Puvirnituq Mayor Lucy Qalingo wrote on Facebook late Saturday night. "I don't know what else to say." Earlier that day, hours before the fire started, the mayor had also taken to Facebook to say that "both governments should stop ignoring the high needs of everything in Nunavik" and issued an urgent call for help, writing: "Please don't fail us." "If we don't see changes from the result of the crisis we are going through, we are definitely nothing to them. What we are going through right now happens in third world countries," Qalingo wrote in the Facebook post. "We don't have to beg for water. We are also Canadians. Forgotten Canadians." CBC News also has reached out to the office of Ian Lafrenière — Quebec's minister responsible for relations with the First Nations and the Inuit — as well as the office of Canada's new Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty. Earlier this week, Lafrenière said he had been in touch with the Kativik Regional Government and the Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services for the past three weeks and that his government was ready to provide assistance. Two planes loaded with water left Montreal for Puvirnituq on Friday morning. The province's ministry of public security said three more water deliveries were scheduled over the weekend, though weather conditions could affect those operations.
CBC
16-04-2025
- Climate
- CBC
Frozen pipe forces Puvirnituq, Que., residents to go days without water delivery
Social Sharing Residents in Puvirnituq, Que., are being forced to go days without water being delivered, due to a frozen water pipeline. In a news release issued on Monday, the Kativik Regional Government (KRG) said the frozen pipe was detected nearly a month ago, on March 17. That was after an extended blizzard, and to this day, the pipe still hasn't thawed. Mayor Lucy Qalingo believes a wire which warms the decades-old pipe, and keeps water flowing, was damaged during the storm. That's blocking the flow of raw, untreated water. The pipe runs south from the village to the raw water pumping station, which is situated roughly 2.5 kilometres away. Now, the village has to send water trucks there to collect raw water and have it manually chlorinated. "The extended travel distance on icy roads and prolonged loading times are reducing distribution efficiency," KRG said in the news release. On top of that, Qalingo said two out of five water delivery trucks aren't working, and they are still awaiting parts for repairs. Some households haven't received water delivery for days on end, and she said the village is having to crowd-source for help to get delivery drivers and trucks, including from the school, the hospital, and Hydro Quebec. "It's been very, very difficult, especially people with a lot of family [members] and those with special needs," Qalingo said. "Plus, the water [pipe] … it usually flows to the hospital underground. So trying to keep up with the hospital as well has been very challenging." Issues time and time again The secondary school was forced to close early last week as it had no water – but that issue isn't new. Schools across the region, including in Aupaluk, Akulivik, Inukjuak and Puvirnituq, have closed several times since 2023 due to water or sewage problems. Qalingo said there have been times when they've been down to one water delivery truck. The constant water woes, she said, affects their ability to fill critical jobs. "Sometimes we cannot fill in the vacancies of the positions that are important to the community, like trying to have a doctor or teachers. They know so much about the water issues in the region," she said. KRG listed a series of factors affecting the delivery of reliable drinking water. They include "water infrastructure limitations; limited capacity of alternate delivery by water trucks; retaining experienced technical staff; and inadequate funding to install a water delivery system that meets acceptable standards." Plea for Ottawa to help KRG said it's exploring another way to get water temporarily flowing over the coming spring and summer. Qalingo said it's getting some support from KRG, but the solution has to flow from the top – the federal government – to regional authorities to fix their infrastructure. "Sometimes I wonder why the government doesn't want to fund the basic human needs ... in the region," she said. "We are Canadians. We deserve the same treatment [as] other provinces." In February's council meetings, KRG said it had 115 work-in-progress projects under the Isurruutiit municipal infrastructure improvement program worth $136 million, with $53 million allocated to drinking water, wastewater and storm water infrastructure. A spokesperson for Indigenous Services Canada said its department doesn't provide funding to KRG for water and wastewater services. "These services fall under provincial responsibility and are funded by the province of Quebec via the Sanarrutik Agreement." Helping each other out In the future, Qalingo would like to see an aqueduct built for the community. But for now, as authorities scramble to find a temporary and permanent solution, the village of roughly 2,100 people is doing its best to get by. Qalingo said the village has recreated a hole in a river by the village. That's where they used to collect water before the current water pumping station was built. A strong community spirit is also getting everyone through, the mayor says.
