Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up on my statement, my questions are to the Minister of Infrastructure.
Can the Minister of Infrastructure share with anticipation whether there will be a Sahtu regional sailing reason, what actions are taken with or by MTS and Cooper Barging discussion. Masi.
Thank you, Member from the Sahtu. Minister of Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First off, I want to thank the Member for acknowledging some of the hard work that's been done by the infrastructure staff over the last little while. Obviously navigating climate change is -- no pun intended, navigating climate change is not an easy task considering we have no control over that. However, the actions being taken by the MTS, our infrastructure staff and MTS, has many plans and layers of it to hopefully have a successful navigating system. And it's really hard to tell right now what that might entail due to the fact of we don't know what the water levels are going to be like.
So we are closely monitoring those water levels, and we're closely monitoring, you know, the ability to get barges and tugs up and down the river. And those plans have been underway for a while now. So our goal with MTS is to have somewhat of a barging season, which includes a smaller section of barging from Dooley Crossing, as stated earlier, to the Sahtu area and potentially from north to the Sahtu area. So looking at many options. And so the goal is to work with another barging company to try to get fuel and freight into the Sahtu region. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thanks to the Minister for that information. I'm glad to hear that there is a preliminary sailing season, hopefully sailing season discussions.
The Minister answered my next question, so I'll skip that one there and add another couple more. If water levels permit, will the Minister, to avoid and detect hazard areas, will there be a water depth surveillance crew accompanying the barges? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. MTS wouldn't be navigating the Mackenzie River without buoys set up by the Canadian coast guard. So that's a safety thing, and that's something that we'd -- like he said earlier in his Member's statement, we don't want to risk the environment, so we will wait for Canadian coast guard to put up the buoys in order to navigate the Mackenzie River. And from previous briefings, I know that they're really anticipating getting out there and looking at our waterways. We know some of the trouble spots of getting through, like the Fort Providence rapids -- rapid area, the Sans Sault area. There's quite a few areas that are concerning, and the coast guard would go out there and navigate them and send smaller vessels through first to determine whether or not they can get the buoys out there. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Infrastructure. Final Supplementary. Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thanks to the Minister for that information there.
Moving along to my next final question here, is there -- can the Minister share the information, how much cargo is booked for the Sahtu, whether it's fuel or dry or modular units? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That is a very good question. I don't know if I have the details handy yet. I know that they're waiting for a keep point to determine whether or not we would even be accepting freight in Hay River to put on the barges or whether or not they would hold off. So we'd have to wait to determine to see what we're getting, so I'll have to get back to the Member and let him know what freight's for the area. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Infrastructure. Oral questions. Member from Great Slave.
