Sam is sort of glad to be in Sault Ste. Marie

Sam Wesley doesn't want to go back to Kashechewan.

Sam, 15, (shown, right) and brother Gary, 16, (shown hamming for our camera) were on the AirCreebec Dash 8 that landed at Sault Ste. Marie Airport just after 2 p.m. yesterday.

They said they were sort of glad to be here.

"We wanted to go to Timmins to be with our mom," said Sam. "But we didn't have a choice."

Sam and Gary's mom lives in Timmins with two of their sisters, so the boys were expecting to be evacuated there with the rest of their family living in Kashechewan.

But Timmins was full by the time their dad, Gary Wesley Sr. decided to pack up his family and head out of Kashechewan.

"We don't know how long we'll be here in the Sault," said Sam. "It's a good start, though, and I'm not going back."

Sam said bad water isn't the only reason he doesn't want to live in Kashechewan.

"It wasn't very good up there," he said. "There is nothing to look forward to."

Gary and Sam came to the Sault yesterday with five other family members and Sam is hoping to get to Timmins some how, to move in with his mother so he doesn't have to go back to Kash.

He said there've been extensive problems with the community for a long time and that it's in urgent need of better schools, health care, more First Nation policing and housing as well as clean water.

Residents of the Nishnawbe-Aski Nation member community have been without clean drinking water for weeks.

Kashechewan, a fly-in community about 450 kilometres north of Timmins, declared a state of emergency on October 14, when its water treatment facility broke down.