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Earthquake causes major damage in Alaska NEWS 7

Saturday, December 1, 2018 | Your community newspaper since ince 1916

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Firefighters battle a duplex fire on Pinewood Avenue Friday afternoon.

Duplex fire causes plume of smoke seen across city Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff mnielsen@pgcitizen.ca A fire in a 3700-block Pinewood Ave. duplex produced a massive plume of smoke and drew a crowd of curious onlookers when it broke out early Friday afternoon. It wasn’t hard for firefighters to find when they were alerted shortly after 1 p.m. “We could see smoke from all the way across town,” Prince George Fire Rescue chief John Iverson said. Firefighters from three halls were initially deployed and those from a fourth hall were also called in after it posed some initial trouble. “We had our hands full for a few minutes,” Iverson said and later added the fire had spread to the roof structure of the adjacent home in the duplex.

“The way that this building is framed presented us with some challenges but we’ve been able to chase this fire and I think we’ve got it all well in hand,” Iverson said. No one was injured but Sadwinder Singh, one of two people who were at home at the time, found himself using a water bottle to clean the soot off his face after making his escape. He said he and his roommate were upstairs when they noticed smoke coming from the basement and got out. In all, five College of New Caledonia students were living in his side of the duplex. It appeared that no one living in the other side of the duplex was home at the time. The blaze produced a plume of thick smoke that easily rose 100 metres into the air. Neighbours and other onlookers stood across the street watching as firefighters directed hoses and worked to contain the fire.

Facebook willing to listen, Zimmer says Quake shakes up Peace region Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies MP Bob Zimmer believes Facebook will start to clean up its act following a showdown between politicians from eight countries and the social media giant. Zimmer was among three Canadian MPs in the United Kingdom this week as part of a “grand committee” coined to investigate Facebook’s effect on the world’s democratic systems. The proceedings got off on the wrong foot when Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg declined to appear, sending vice-president for policy solutions, Richard Allan, in his stead. Zimmer said Allan was knowledgeable but unable to provide answers to all of the committee’s questions and maintained Zuckerberg would still have been the better option. Prime among Zimmer’s concerns is the possibility

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that third parties could skirt federal election laws by advertising on Facebook. As it stands, third party advertising is banned during election periods in Canada and the parties are limited on how much they can spend during that time. The federal Liberals have introduced a bill, C-76, aimed at stopping foreign attempts to influence how Canadians vote but it has been criticized as too weak in terms of the administrative penalties it would impose. Liberal independent Sen. Serge Joyal has expressed disappointment that it does not include provisions to seize the assets of any foreign entity that attempts to influence a Canadian election. Zimmer said the parliamentary committee he chairs is working to give the bill more teeth but in the meantime, he would like to see a “best practices” drafted for social media that Facebook could adopt. — see ‘WE NEED TO BE, page 3

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Alaska Highway News There was an estimated 4.5-magnitude earthquake just south of Fort St. John Thursday evening. The earthquake happened around 6:25 p.m., with its estimated epicentre just 16 kilometres southwest of the city, according to Earthquakes Canada. The precise location and scale is unknown, as is the cause. That’s subject to change as more data comes in, said John Cassidy, an earthquake seismologist with Natural Resources Canada. “It’s one of the stronger ones

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in quite some time. We’ve seen larger, but it’s certainly right up there,” Cassidy said. A 3.3-magnitude aftershock was recorded at 7:06 p.m., and a second aftershock near magnitude 4 was recorded at 7:15. Residents across Northeast B.C. reported feeling loud, strong tremors that shook houses for several seconds in Fort St. John, Charlie Lake, Taylor, Chetwynd, Dawson Creek, Hudson’s Hope and rural communities in between. Some have said they felt tremors as far away as Pouce Coupe and Baytree, Alta. — see ‘IT SHOOK, page 3

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