Canada Fires: State Of Emergency As Homes Ruined

A state of emergency has been declared in the Canadian province of Alberta as wildfires continue to rip through the region.

More than 80,000 residents were forced to flee the main oil sands city of Fort McMurray on Tuesday night as hundreds of firefighters battled desperately against the flames.

They are being helped by a dozen helicopters, two air tankers groups and nine air tankers, according to Danielle Larivee, Alberta's Minister of Municipal Affairs.

The Canadian Forces have also deployed helicopters and Ms Larivee said that the state of emergency would "enable us to bring more measures to support operations".

Alberta Premier Rachel Notley said 1,600 buildings had been damaged or destroyed by the fire but that no injuries or deaths had been reported.

There was a fatal collision on a nearby road that has not been officially connected to the evacuation or fires.

Fort McMurray Fire Chief Darby Allen described the 7,500 hectare blaze as "a nasty, dirty fire".

He added: "There are certainly areas of the city that have not been burned, but this fire will look for them and it will find them and it will want to take them."

Unseasonably high temperatures and dry conditions have left the boreal forest in much of Alberta vulnerable and officials expect more strong winds and hot weather to make things worse.

Most of the evacuees have headed south to Edmonton, the province's capital which is about 260 miles away, but many had little time to pack supplies before they left their homes.

Fort McMurray resident Breanna Schmidt said: "We had to literally drive through smoke and fire, vehicles littered all over the sides of the road, and we had to drive as fast as we could and breathe as little as we could because the smoke was so intense and we could feel the heat from inside the vehicle."

Federal Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale called it one of the largest fire evacuations in Canadian history, if not the largest.

He said: "This is going to take a while to recover."