OTTAWA - Prime Minister Mark Carney stood in the House of Commons on Monday, October 19, and read into the record the names of four Canadian soldiers killed two days earlier at Canadian Forces Base Wainwright in Alberta. “Mr. Speaker, this House meets today, united in grief,” he began. On Saturday afternoon, soldiers taking part in a live-fire training exercise were caught by a fire burning in the training area. Driven by fierce winds, the fire jumped nearly a kilometre in less than a minute to where the soldiers were gathered, Carney told the House. Four soldiers were killed, and 39 were injured in the space of a few minutes.
Two of the four who died were from the Lower Mainland. Pte Hayden Lykkemark was from Langley, and Pte Aidan Goulding was from North Vancouver. Both served with the 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. The other two were Pte Shaun Farrell, of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, also a member of the 3rd Battalion, and Sgt Morgan Wong, of Edmonton, Alberta, a member of the Loyal Edmonton Regiment who had served with NATO allies in Latvia and was preparing for a second tour in Europe.
What happened on the training range
According to the account the Prime Minister gave the House, soldiers of the 3rd Battalion and members of the Army Reserve training alongside them were conducting live-fire exercises when a fire was burning in the training area. The original cause of the fire is not yet known, he said. Military and civilian crews fought the fire in some of the worst conditions imaginable. STARS air ambulance crews flew in from Edmonton and Saskatoon, and the injured were carried to hospitals in Wainwright, Edmonton, Red Deer and Calgary. At every hospital, liaison officers are now at the sides of the families, and the Surgeon General is coordinating care with the provinces so that every injured soldier receives the specialized treatment they need.
The four who were lost
Carney paused on each of the four names, sharing how each man was known by the soldiers who served beside him.
Pte Aidan Goulding, of North Vancouver, “met every hardship with a joke,” the Prime Minister said, and when others struggled, he shouldered more than his share without ever being asked.
Pte Shaun Farrell, of Prince Albert, was a generous and deeply loyal friend, known in his battalion as the “Grand Master of Chess.” He planned to make the Forces his career.
Pte Hayden Lykkemark, of Langley, had a gift for lightening a hard day, and he dreamed of a career in law enforcement. He and Farrell were best friends, Carney told the House, and were seldom seen apart.
Sgt Morgan Wong, of Edmonton, had served with Canada’s NATO allies in Latvia and was preparing for his second tour in Europe. His family remembers him, the Prime Minister said, as someone who was always there for anyone who needed him.
“These were sons, brothers, partners, and friends,” Carney said, young men with bright futures who chose to serve their country, and who died in that cause.
Fifty investigators on the ground
The Canadian Forces National Investigation Service, the military’s investigative service, is leading a full investigation into the tragedy, with support from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Some 50 investigators are on the ground, and the Prime Minister said the government will ensure they have all the resources they need to complete their work thoroughly and expeditiously. The Minister of National Defence is in Wainwright with the soldiers’ commanders, while the Minister of Emergency Management is in Edmonton, working alongside Alberta’s Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Services at the Provincial Emergency Operations Centre. Mental health teams and chaplains are in Wainwright, at the hospitals, and on bases across the country, because, as Carney put it, the tragedy is felt everywhere in the Canadian Forces.
A loss that reaches Surrey and Langley
For families in the Lower Mainland, the loss is close to home. Armed Forces members from across the country come to train at CFB Wainwright to prepare to serve Canada, and the soldiers on the range on Saturday were preparing to join the Canadian Armed Forces’ Global Response Task Force, which can deploy within hours anywhere in the world Canada needs them. Among other duties, they were preparing to take part in Operation REASSURANCE in Latvia, where Canada leads NATO forces on the front line of Europe’s defence. Many of the injured are still fighting for their lives, the Prime Minister said, and for many others, recovery will be long and difficult.
In Surrey, the City marked the deaths publicly on Monday. A notice posted on the City of Surrey website, titled “Tragedy at Canadian Forces Base Wainwright in Alberta,” states that flags at Surrey City Hall and civic buildings were lowered to half-mast on October 19, 2026. It is a gesture of civic mourning mirrored in communities across the country, including Wainwright itself, where, as the Prime Minister relayed from Mayor Bruce Pugh, the people of the town share their lives with the women and men at the base, and now share their grief.
“Now, Canada serves them”
The Prime Minister thanked Premier Danielle Smith and the Government of Alberta for their partnership, and Alberta’s health workers for carrying an enormous load. He thanked premiers across the country who immediately offered help, and Canadians who are lining up to give blood and feeding and housing the emergency crews who worked through the night. In a few weeks, Canadians will gather at cenotaphs across the country for Remembrance Day, including the cenotaph in Wainwright. This year, he said, those gatherings will carry more names. He closed by turning the soldiers’ service back on the country that sent them to train: they were training to defend Canada, and now, he said, “Canada serves them.”
Sources: Prime Minister of Canada, “Prime Minister Carney delivers remarks in the House of Commons following the tragedy at CFB Wainwright,” October 19, 2026 (pm.gc.ca); City of Surrey, “Tragedy at Canadian Forces Base Wainwright in Alberta,” notice, October 19, 2026 (surrey.ca).
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