When Ross McLean returned to his home in Montreal two days after being forced to leave due to rising water levels, he found his basement submerged under five feet of water.
“The foundation is going to have to be totally redone, everything’s going to have to be ripped and gutted,” McLean said. “It’s the same for basically anybody else that’s along the water in old Ile Bizard.”
McLean’s neighbourhood was hit hard in the flooding that prompted Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre to declare a state of emergency earlier this week. The heavy rains and subsequent flooding that began last week have forced 2,800 from their homes in 166 municipalities in Quebec.
McLean said he “put up the good fight,” but couldn’t keep the water out, and was forced to leave at 5 a.m. on Sunday morning.
“It just wasn’t safe when I saw that I was alone,” he said. “All my neighbours had already left.”
McLean phoned the fire department, who advised him to leave, “so I agreed to that and I shut down the power.”
McLean’s in-laws took him in, but he has since returned to the neighbourhood to help with flooding efforts.
In an interview with CTV News Channel from his flooded neighbourhood, McLean described the conditions as “cold,” and said the water only stopped rising in the street on Tuesday.
Helping others with recovery efforts, McLean said, is helping him deal with the magnitude of the disaster.
“I figure if I had bad memories that are going to pop up … the quicker that I get good memories to replace them, maybe that’ll help.”
The grim reality was setting in for Itsik Romano, who lives in Pierrefonds, Que. He visited his home for the first time since the flooding on Tuesday.
“The whole street is underwater, except at the ends, at the beginning and the end,” he told CTV News. “In the middle, it’s a river. It’s quite crazy.”
Romano said, despite best efforts, “On Saturday and Sunday we knew we would not win the fight against the water flow.”
Romano said he was given no “instructions” during evacuation. And days later, he has “no clue” when he’ll be allowed to go home.
“We don’t even know where to go to report the fact that our house is flooded and that we have damage,” he said. “Right now we are in the unknown zone.”
On Wednesday, Heritage Minister Melanie Joly visited homes in her Montreal riding of Ahuntsic-Cartierville grappling with the unrelenting floodwaters.
“We’ll be in close contact with the province to make sure that people are supported,” Joly said.
Approximately 1,700 Canadian Forces troops are helping with the flood recovery effort. Defence minister Harjit Sajjan says by the end of Wednesday, 2,200 troops would be involved in the flood fight. The Canadian Red Cross has set up a relief fund, with contributions from the federal and Quebec governments.
