There may be hope for 300 homeowners who are waiting to see whether officials will release floodwater into their community to avoid damaging another 800 properties in southern Manitoba.
Officials now say diversionary channels are working better than expected, taking pressure off dikes along the Assiniboine River.
Earlier, officials said they may have to release floodwater to relieve the dikes. That would likely swamp 300 homes west of Winnipeg -- twice as many as originally thought.
Kam Blight, the municipal reeve in Portage La Prairie, Man., said the controlled flood would also submerge valuable farmland.
Provincial authorities are weighing whether to release water from the surging Assiniboine River near Portage La Prairie in the hopes of minimizing flooding in other regions. They said the move would only swamp about 150 homes and would spare 800 others.
Residents have begun frantically sandbagging around many of the homes that could be inundated.
Shay Doherty, who owns a greenhouse business in the area, said he was shocked to hear that provincial officials were planning to intentionally breach a nearby dike.
"That's a mile away from me. I'm going to get flooded," Doherty said.
Further west, officials in Manitoba's second-largest city are hopeful that flooding preparations will spare their residents from the rising waters.
The threats posed to life and land by the swollen Assiniboine have left officials in Brandon, Man., scrambling to buttress their dike defences and to evacuate hundreds of people living in low-lying areas.
But as of late Tuesday morning, officials believed that their hard work might succeed in keeping the water away from vulnerable homes and properties. The river's level did not increase overnight and it is possible that it has now peaked.
Brandon lies more than two hours west of Winnipeg. It is one of eight communities under a state of emergency because of the water levels on the Assiniboine.
The evacuations ordered by Brandon officials have so far been directed at people living on the south side of the river.
CTV's Caroline Barghout reported Tuesday that people on the other side of the river could find themselves in the same boat if conditions worsen. But for now they won't have to leave their homes.
"As of today, the emergency measures coordinator spoke to us and said, at this point, the river level seems to have stabilized and it doesn't appear that they will need to evacuate the north side," Barghout reported from Brandon on Tuesday morning.
Brandon's emergency public information officer, Con Arvisais, told CTV News Channel that evacuation "isn't required at this point" on the north side of the river.
Earlier Tuesday, Brian Kayes, the director of emergency management in Brandon, said the water levels did not advance overnight on the Assiniboine.
"We're hoping that this is as high as it's going to go here, but we never know," Kayes said during a telephone interview on Tuesday morning.
Barghout said some 500 members of the Canadian Forces were expected in Manitoba on Tuesday to help fill and stack 2.7 million sandbags that will be used to protect communities along the Assiniboine.
With files from The Canadian Press and a report from CTV Winnipeg's Caroline Barghout
