Heritage Festival extended one hour Monday after early shutdown due to strong winds

Edmonton’s Heritage Festival is being extended by one hour on Monday to make up for the early wind-related closure on Sunday.

Monday’s festivities will now end at 9 p.m. instead of 8 p.m.

Mayor Andrew Knack says the decision was made to strengthen the festival’s final day.

The Edmonton Heritage Festival, now in its 53rd year, puts the cultures of 80 groups in the spotlight across 63 pavillions at William Hawrelak Park — from Saturday to Monday.

“This extra hour is going to give Edmontonians the opportunity to come down, experience the festival, support the pavilions and celebrate incredible diversity,” the mayor said.

Winds of up to 90 kilometres per hour — according to a warning from Environment Canada — forced the festival to shut down early Sunday afternoon. Festival organizer said that “exceeded the safety standards of tents at the festival.”

“This combined with ground already saturated from recent heavy rainfall, caused damage to festival tents and some injuries at William Hawrelak Park,” the Edmonton Heritage Festival Association wrote in a social media post Sunday. “Early this afternoon, festival organizers directed all patrons to evacuate the park and proceed to the ETS park-and-ride for safe transport home.

“Emergency personnel and festival staff worked quickly to clear the site and ensure everyone left safely. We are grateful to our staff, volunteers, city crews, and emergency responders for their swift response. The safety of our attendees, vendors, performers, staff, and volunteers is our first priority, and it will always take precedence over the festival schedule.”

But some pavilions are wondering if the decision to end early was the right one.

“The storm was gone before they even finished evacuating,” said Erin Penniket from the El Salvador pavilion. “Before they even got going on the evacuation. There was no need to shut it down.”

Penniket wondered if Monday’s one-hour extension was a fair trade-off.

“We didn’t just lose the revenue, but we also have expenses. Because we all came in and then there’s all the food that’s not going to be sold. It’s a three-day event; one hour isn’t gonna make up for being shut down early.”

Lily Ferradas from the Peru pavilion also felt the financial hit from the early closure.

“There was food cooking. We were in the process of cutting food,” Ferradas told CityNews. “There was meat out; we had to make sure we have to get that meat back to the cooler. The amount of money that… my parents are worried. There’s a lot of stress and we wanna keep being able to do this and bring it to as many people as we can.”

Ferradas has been helping run the Peruvian pavilion at the Heritage Festival to continue what her grandmother Carmen started more than 25 years ago. With a strong drive to share her culture with other Edmontonians, Ferradas is already hoping to see improvements next year.

“Just more communication and more diligence,” she said. “We’ve had a lot of issues with the tents breaking. And I know it’s weather, but also we should be anticipating the weather.”

The president of the Edmonton Heritage Festival says weather has indeed been a huge challenge for organizers this year.

“We’ve never had a year with so much rain, wind, and all the factors have been super challenging,” said Daniel Hernandez. “So for us, it’s an opportunity for planning maybe about these things. Really analyzing what went well, what went wrong, and adjusting our emergency management plan based on that.”

The festival was back at William Hawrelak Park this year after three years at Borden Park due to construction.