Chemical tank implosion at at Nippon Dynawave Packaging in Longview, Washington leaves 1 dead, 9 unaccounted for. In related news: investigators say the Maine lumber mill explosion began in a sawdust silo; Weyerhaeuser, Alberta is fined for 2023 sawmill incident; a Tennessee lumber company is struck by tornado; and Domtar responds to lawsuit over mill odours. In other Business news: Ontario invest $14M to strengthen forest competitiveness; US trade officials push a ‘Fortress North America’ approach to manufacturing; Canada’s trade diversification shows mixed results; and tensions continue ahead of USMCA negotiations.
In Forestry news: Forests Canada and Ontario Parks restore nine provincial parks; BC explains what ‘out of control’ means in wildfire management; UBC forestry instructors help lead a UN forest report; a BC aviation firms join Canada’s new firefighting fleet; SFI announces five Climate Smart funding recipients; and Kerry Rouck is appointed to the BC Forest Practices Board.
Finally, on Day 3 of Forest Safety Week: worker competency assessments, tick safety, and the lasting lessons from a devastating sawmill injury.
Kelly McCloskey, Tree Frog News Editor
Completing worker assessments is an important part of maintaining a safe and successful operation. Typically, a supervisor is responsible for this process within a company or operation. BCFSC’s one-on-one assessments are a valuable tool to ensure there are no gaps in the knowledge, skills and attributes each worker needs to do their job safely and productively. These assessments are intended for both new workers and experienced workers. Young workers can benefit from the guidance and experience they gain through interaction with their supervisor. Experienced workers can benefit by demonstrating their skills and knowledge against an industry-developed standard.
The United States’ top trade official says he’s pushing for changes to continental trade rules to prioritize U.S. content in manufacturing supply chains, but sees a path to preferential tariff rates in North America if Canada and Mexico co-operate with external tariffs on other countries. At the same time, Jamieson Greer warned that negotiations with Canada around the future of the country’s auto sector could be difficult, while discussions about trade in commodities should prove easier. …Canada has not yet started formal talks with the U.S. and won’t be at the negotiating table this week in Mexico City. The three governments have to decide on July 1 whether to extend the agreement for 16 years or move to a period of annual reviews for 10 years. …Ottawa has signalled an openness to this type of “Fortress North America” approach. But Prime Minister Mark Carney wants to see the U.S. lower its sectoral tariffs on automobiles, steel, aluminum, copper and wood products in return for moves toward deeper integration in key sectors. [A Globe and Mail subscription is required for full access to this story]
OTTAWA – A small group of cities across the country drove Canada’s progress on diversifying trade in 2025, while others fell behind, says a new report from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. The report says Calgary, Ottawa-Gatineau, Toronto, Saskatoon and Kelowna, B.C., are the cities that made the strongest gains in export diversification beyond the U.S. market last year. Of the cities surveyed, Calgary and Ottawa-Gatineau posted the largest increases in exports to non-U.S. markets between 2024 and 2025 — 64.67 per cent and 64.04 per cent, respectively. … The chamber’s new report says recent Statistics Canada data on business responses to U.S. tariffs suggests many Canadian firms are “adapting cautiously” rather than fundamentally repositioning their operations. The report says that while exports to non-U.S. markets rose sharply between 2024 and 2025, much of that growth came from existing exporters expanding their reach rather than new firms entering global markets. 
The Trump administration intends to maintain tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said as the US launches negotiations to revamp the North American free trade pact. The US has “significant” trade issues with Canada. …”The US is going to have tariffs,” Greer said. “I mean, even with somebody like Mexico, or other countries that are in our own hemisphere, we’re going to have tariffs as long as we have a giant trade deficit.” His comments that the 6-year-old US-Mexico-Canada Agreement will not continue as a tariff-free trade pact echo comments he made privately last month to industry executives in Mexico — that auto and steel tariffs will remain in place under the revamped USMCA. …Greer said the Trump administration’s issues with Canada go well beyond trade “irritants” and it was difficult to see how the two can work out their differences.
SAULT STE. MARIE — The Ontario government is investing more than $14 million to build a modern, digital system to inventory the province’s forest resources, giving industry access to better information to invest, grow and create jobs. …this investment will modernize the Forest Resources Inventory (FRI) Information Management System, the essential database of Ontario’s managed forests, by replacing outdated systems with cutting-edge technology to make critical forest data more accurate, accessible and easier to use. …Through a strategic partnership with Microsoft, powered by Databricks technology, the province is developing customized digital tools to modernize how Ontario collects, stores and shares forest inventory information, strengthening the sector’s long-term competitiveness and resilience in the global economy. This work is a key commitment in the 
KINGSPORT, Tennessee — Domtar Paper has filed a response to 
Three years ago, Barb Round heard heavy machinery chewing through the urban forest behind her home in Campbell River, a small city on east Vancouver Island that bills itself as the salmon capital of the world. Round waved down a man in a hard hat and asked why the excavator was working in the greenway, which is a haven for birds, dotted with pocket wetlands and adjacent to Simms Creek, home to four salmon species. “He explained to me that the property had been sold,” Round, a retired nurse, tells The Tyee. “Everyone in the neighbourhood thought it was protected land.” When residents found out a local developer planned to cut down much of the forest and fill in the wetlands to build a large housing development near the creek, “they were gobsmacked,” Round says.
LONGVIEW, Wash. — A massive chemical tank holding nearly a million gallons of a highly corrosive liquid imploded and collapsed Tuesday at a Washington paper mill, killing at least one worker and leaving nine others unaccounted for with no hope for rescue, authorities said. Another nine people were injured, some severely, in the spill at Nippon Dynawave Packaging Co. in Longview. The cause remained unclear. “At the moment we are not aware of any rescues that are yet to be made,” Cowlitz Fire and Rescue Chief Scott Goldstein said during a Tuesday evening news conference in which officials repeatedly referred to the situation as a recovery effort. That effort would not resume until Wednesday morning, when emergency responders planned to work on stabilizing the collapsed tank, which still had about 90,000 gallons (more than 340,000 liters) of a chemical brew known as “white liquor” inside, and then search for the missing, Goldstein said.
MAINE — The fire and subsequent explosion at a Maine lumber mill that killed a firefighter and injured a dozen other people was accidental and originated at the base of a silo, authorities said Tuesday. …Rapid ignition of particulate material resulted in an explosion in the silo that caused it to lift from its concrete base and release large amounts of sawdust and other materials, the Maine State Fire Marshal’s Office said. The silo then toppled and the surrounding area became engulfed in fire, the office said. Investigators will return to the facility in the coming months to conduct a more detailed examination, the fire marshal’s office said. “Investigators also determined the facility’s fire suppression system, which was located near the top of the silo, did not activate because temperatures at that elevation did not reach the activation threshold after the fire originated at the base of the silo,” the office’s statement said.