‘On pins and needles’: rain worsens spring flood

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/05/2022 (1188 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A third straight weekend of wet weather worsened flooding along the Red River corridor this week, washing out roads and evacuating homes in several municipalities.

Manitoba’s Hydrologic Forecast Centre said the floodwaters will reach or exceed 2009 levels. The Red River is expected to crest as early as this weekend in Emerson, and May 11-14 in St Adolphe.

As of Tuesday, a flood warning remained in effect for the Red River from Emerson to the floodway inlet, all Red River tributaries, the Whiteshell Lakes area, the Whitemouth River, and the Birch River. The Roseau River is under a flood watch.

An overland flood warning was issued for southern Manitoba from Brandon to the Ontario border, including the south Interlake region.

Provincial crews were deployed to several communities along the Red River, running pumping operations and implementing dike closures as needed. Local residents are being asked to monitor conditions and take proactive steps to protect their property.

Rain fell steadily across much of the Southeast from Friday evening through Sunday morning, pooling atop a landscape already saturated by back-to-back spring storms and above-average winter snowfalls.

Since April 1, southeastern Manitoba has received 120 to 160 millimetres of precipitation, which the province said is 400 to 600 percent of normal amounts. Manitoba Infrastructure warned Monday that water levels will remain high “for an extended duration” throughout southern and central Manitoba.

Twenty-four Manitoba municipalities have declared states of local emergency, including the RMs of Emerson-Franklin, Morris, Ritchot, Montcalm, and Whitemouth. A crew on Roseau River First Nation is “working around the clock” to protect the community’s roads, cemeteries, and powwow arbour, the Southern Chiefs’ Organization said last week.

Highway 75 north of Morris was closed Friday evening. The south side followed suit Monday evening, sealing the town inside its ring dike and forcing motorists to use detours. Highway 23 West was closed to Provincial Road 422, but Highway 23 East will remain open.

Ritchot

As of Tuesday, 160 evacuation notices had been issued in the RM of Ritchot, including all homes located between St Adolphe and the Seine River Diversion. At press time, provincial crews were preparing to close Provincial Road 210 east of St Adolphe.

Across the RM, 13 municipal roads and one bridge were closed. In Ste Agathe, pumps worked overtime in numerous locations around town. The Red River on Tuesday surpassed 770 feet in Ste Agathe, bringing it to within four feet of 2009 levels.

Mayor Chris Ewen said he hasn’t seen the river this high in his eight years residing in Ritchot.

“Shocking is probably the best word,” he said Tuesday by phone.

On Friday, Premier Heather Stefanson and Infrastructure Minister Doyle Piwniuk toured St Adolphe.

Ewen said he’s concerned that less than one in three residents who had received an evacuation order had heeded it. Ewen said some property owners waited too long to begin protecting their properties and were now stranded.

“Make sure that when you do get an evacuation notice, you check out that checklist, what’s involved in that, and take the time to prepare your home in case waters do rise quick,” he said.

Ewen said the flood is also bringing out volunteerism and perseverance, even among those frustrated by the long winter and cold, wet spring.

“We’re seeing a lot of strong people doing a lot of good things,” he said.

“We’re used to seeing water like this in Ritchot, we’re used to seeing water like this in the Red River basin. So as long as we have the tools, the volunteers, the personnel, and the desire…we’re going to do whatever we can to get through this.”

Montcalm

The RM of Montcalm had ordered 27 homes to evacuate. Reeve Paul Gilmore said Tuesday most residents were following the order. Evacuees were being sheltered in Steinbach, Winkler, and Winnipeg.

As of Tuesday, the Red River had nearly reached 784 feet at Letellier, half a foot below its forecasted peak.

“We’re kind of all on pins and needles waiting for that (crest),” Gilmore said.

The RM’s list of road closures grew to 47 yesterday. The rising waters even forced the RM to relocate one of its sandbag filling stations.

“The communities are protected and most of the farmyards are protected by ring dikes,” Gilmore said. “Public works are working almost 24-7 and we’re really proud of the way they’ve come through in this situation.”

Pumps were running in St Jean, where the north highway entrance was closed Tuesday. Gilmore said St Joseph is the only Montcalm community that lacks a ring dike.

Gilmore said the RM is getting the support it needs from the province, but worried about spring seeding.

“I kind of worry for the farmers getting into the fields. It’s going to be in June.”

He was coming to terms with a flood situation that a month ago seemed exceedingly unlikely.

“I didn’t expect this. But two Colorado lows later and all that rain we’ve received changed my mind,” Gilmore said.

Many Montcalm residents do their shopping in Morris, and Gilmore said the province may have closed Highway 75 too soon.

“People are upset with the Highway 75 access being closed in Morris because that complicates everybody’s lives.”

Still, he acknowledged that flooding was nothing new in Montcalm.

“People that have lived here a long time are used to floods,” Gilmore said. “The newcomers may be a bit different.”

Emerson-Franklin

The RM of Emerson-Franklin is battling both river and overland flooding. As of Tuesday, 15 roads were washed out and 17 properties had been issued evacuation notices. The dike at Emerson was partially closed and crews were on standby in Dominion City.

“We were quite disappointed to see that the flood had been upgraded to 2009 levels,” Reeve Dave Carlson said. “We have a pretty robust diking system and we’re flood-proofed to ’97 plus two feet, but we will lose some roads, and with that, some access.”

He also lamented that overland flooding will strew debris across farmers’ fields and plug municipal drains.

“We were having such a nice melt and things were going quite well,” Carlson said. “We were thinking that we had the perfect spring. The water table recharged after the drought.”

Carlson said he is urging affected residents to leave now before emergency services can’t reach them.

“We do have boats and different things but we’d like to see people get out and be safe, because once you lose that access you just never know what could happen.”

Municipal services like garbage collection continued this week, and Carlson said residents are generally in good spirits because they know the situation is temporary.

“It’s a nuisance flood.”