As waters begin to recede in British Columbia’s Boundary Country, homeowners are just starting to understand how badly the flood-ravaged region has been impacted.
By Sunday afternoon, evacuation orders on 175 properties in Grand Forks, B.C. had been lifted, affecting about 350 residents. Evacuation orders on 415 properties in Christina Lake were also lifted Sunday.
Grand Forks’ downtown core is expected to re-open to the public on Monday, although many stores will require repairs before they can open for business.
Lenora Stauffer is one of over a thousand evacuees who had to leave their homes. Her family farm was destroyed, taking not only her house, but her animals too.
“Our cows had just given birth,” Stauffer told CTV Vancouver. “The calves drowned. The mother cows drowned. We never did find the calves.”
Residents were given a reprieve over the weekend as a second surge of flooding anticipated for Friday and Saturday didn’t happen thanks to lower temperatures and less rainfall than initially expected.
"I'm excited to say the forecast is improving and the river levels are dropping faster than anticipated," Dan Derby, fire chief for the Regional District of Kootenay Boundary, told The Canadian Press on Sunday.
Despite several evacuation orders being lifted over the weekend, many homes are still sitting in more than a metre of water, with no timetable for when homeowners will be able to return. The majority of the impacted homes are not eligible for flood insurance, leaving homeowners to rely on financial assistance from the federal government.
Earlier this week, approximately 100 members of the Canadian Armed Forces arrived in the area to help residents protect their homes.
“The population of Grand Forks were virtually exhausted,” Capt. Steve Jorgenson, Chief of Staff Operations and Plans with the Joint Task Force Pacific, told CTV News Channel. “The good news is that they didn’t get that second flood event.”
With evacuation orders still in place for about 3,000 residents in the Regional District of Kootenay Boundary, the focus in many of the no-go zones is damage assessment. About 20 rapid damage assessment teams are now investigating homes to try and help officials determine when and where evacuees can return safely.
Due to erosion along the Kettle River, 39 addresses close to the waterway have been issued hazard notices because the riverbanks are no longer stable.
OTHER AREAS OF B.C. KEEPING A CLOSE EYE
In other parts of the province, officials remain on high alert.
In Langley, B.C., emergency personnel are monitoring dikes and will be prepared to pile sandbags if waters get too high.
In Green Bay, the Okanagan Lake is about six centimetres above “full pool” and is expected to rise, according to Kirsten Jones, public information officer for the Regional District of Central Okanagan.
Two properties in the area have been issued evacuation alerts so far.
Capt. Jorgenson says that the troops stationed in Grand Forks will be redeployed around the Okanagan Valley in the coming days to try and help prepare the area, where significant danger remains.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Sarah MacDonald and with files from The Canadian Press
