Parody Twitter account criticized for Fort McMurray fire joke

A popular Twitter account is being criticized for a joke made about the Fort McMurray wildfire late Saturday morning.

The Twitter account, @stats_canada, tweeted, "the Fort McMurray fire was 75% as damaging to Alberta as the Gretzky trade."

Twitter users reacted immediately to the post, with almost all of the responses negative.

"97.3% of Canadians find this tweet in poor taste," wrote one user.

"How did you think that this was amusing or funny in any way?" wrote another.

Some others found the joke amusing. "89% of Albertansare too sensitive," wrote another user.

The Stats Canada Twitter account is a parody account that tweets jokes in the form of statistics. At the time of publication, 81 per cent of responses were negative.

The Fort McMurray wildfire destroyed almost 2,800 homes and displaced around 88,000 people.

The Edmonton Oilers won one more Stanley Cup in 1990after the Wayne Gretzky tradethat sent him to the Los Angeles Kings.

• 6 months after wildfire, Fort McMurray faces long road to recovery
• The Gretzky Trade: By the numbers