VICTORIA – More than a month of rain has fallen in a 48-hour period across swaths of southern British Columbia, leaving thousands of people stranded on flooded roads, trapped between active landslides or fleeing their homes.
British Columbia leaders are not yet saying whether the river’s atmospheric storm is one of the largest seen in the province, but the speed with which it has caused destruction and disruption already makes it a monumental disaster and it is bringing back memories of the widespread wildfires that took place. During the summer, many in the same regions are now affected by storms.
The entire city of Merritt, BC, home to 7,000 people, evacuated their homes Monday morning when water from the Coldwater River broke their banks and filled the streets of surrounding communities like they were part of a plugged bathtub. The images showed trailers collapsed and half submerged by water, and puddles forming around the city’s central school.
Carly Isaac sent photos to the Star as she worked to help drag trucks and cars out of the pits in Merritt, before being ordered to evacuate to either Kamloops or Kelowna, each an hour away.
“Two months ago, we had fire warnings and orders,” Isaac wrote, “Now the water is doing it.”
Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth said search and rescue teams looking for stranded drivers, as well as emergency responders to help with sandbag removal and flood reduction efforts, were already working in communities. from Vancouver Island to inland BC, but conditions were getting worse before getting better.
Water levels, he said, are expected to rise until 3 p.m. local time, and remain high for at least another 24 hours.
Fire crews rescued 12 people in southern British Columbia overnight, including a group of people who were reportedly trapped in their car as floodwaters rose around them, after landslides and rocks caused Due to the incessant rain, roads will be closed in several areas.
Meanwhile, about 100 people were trapped by two slides on the road between Agassiz and Hope, BC Rescue workers said Monday morning they were not in danger. There was no immediate timeline for deleting the slides.
The Agassiz fire department rescued nine people from the area near the westernmost slide, including the family in their car, according to Dave Boone, director of the Heavy Urban Search and Rescue Task Force. Three people were rescued from the slide near Hope. It is not known how many of those rescued were taken to the hospital.
Boone said the task force had been in contact with a woman whose car was among those stuck on the road between the two cities, and that they had asked her to alert others on the road that they were safe and to remain on the scene. for the moment. be.
Among those stuck on the road are Paul and Pamela Deol and children Shawn, 6, and Dylan, 4, who were on their way home to Langley on Sunday after visiting family in Kelowna, when they were trapped by landslides.
Fortunately, they have plenty of food (courtesy of Deol’s Italian mother-in-law, whom they were visiting in Kelowna) and an iPad loaded with movies to keep them entertained.
“It’s fun!” one of the kids chimed in from behind, while Deol added, “They watched three movies last night, which is way over their limit.”
Earlier this morning, Deol posted on a local road reports of a Facebook group offering food for anyone also staying nearby with young children. He said that he has received a couple of messages from other people on the road and that he is happy to give food to anyone who is hungry.
Boone said the landslides, with water and debris still moving, were too dangerous for search and rescue teams to navigate at night, and “viable rescues” were not achieved.
“It doesn’t make sense to put our people in that situation with people who are caught in the middle,” he said. “They are safer where they are than if we had to get in them, because we are not going to bring them back to the other side of the slide.
“We will find out in the morning what we are up against.”
“We feel, and still feel, nervous and scared to be stuck on a narrow stretch of road on a mountainside between two landslides,” said Elaine, a woman from Langley, BC who is currently trapped in the road with your partner. .
“The rain has been relentless all night and keeps falling.”
Boone said that to further complicate matters there were a number of high-voltage power lines running across the landslides that could have been compromised, and potentially some of the hydroelectric towers as well.
The city of Abbotsford opened a reception center on Sunday for residents who were unable to get home or who were forced to flee due to landslides or flooding.
The city said in a statement that mud or rock slides had cut off several routes, and those who needed shelter or assistance could go to the Abbotsford Recreation Center.
Several roads connecting the lower part of the continent and the interior of BC were also cut by rocks, mud and debris, including the closure in both directions of Highway 5 between Hope and Merritt.
Drive BC, the provincial online travel information center, also said Highway 1 through Fraser Canyon was closed in both directions due to rocks on the road north of Yale, while eastbound traffic on the same route at Chilliwack was cut off by a landslide.
With files from Steve McKinley and The Canadian Press
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Reference-www.thestar.com