Whitecourt Chamber starts summer tours of area lumber, pulp and newsprint mills
Each summer, the Whitecourt & District Chamber of Commerce offers free tours of the area’s industrial facilities, including Millar Western’s pulp mill and sawmill and the Alberta Newsprint Company’s newsprint mill. The Chamber’s tour program provides summer employment to the students hired as guides, each of whom receives special training to conduct safe and informative tours, while offering a greatly appreciated service to local industrial operators.
This year, Katrina Bruce will be returning as the Chamber’s Industrial Tours Director, a position she held previously in the summer of 2009. Katrina, who recently graduated from the University of Calgary with a BA in Anthropology and Medieval History, is glad to be home in Whitecourt and back on the job. “I really enjoy taking people around the mills and explaining aspects of how the forest industry works. It’s a chance to draw both on the training I receive from staff at each of the operations and on my own experience as a summer student working in the sawmill in 2008.”
Katrina has taken all kinds of people on her lumber, pulp and newsprint tours — from families and seniors to groups of Forest Rangers and 4-H’ers. “What people tend to enjoy most, is when they are able to talk to the people working in the mills, when they can touch things within the mill processes, and when they see impressive views — like from the roof of the pulp mill, where they can look out over the Macleod and Athabasca Rivers, the lumber yard and Rotary Park.”
With the summer just starting, Katrina has already provided a few mill tours, including one for a group of visitors from Australia, here in Whitecourt as guests of the Rotary Club. The Chamber of Commerce tours will continue through the summer, and are available Monday through Friday, from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm. For more details, including contact and location information, please click the link below:
Whitecourt & District Chamber of Commerce — Industrial Tours Brochure