North Norfolk region slammed by ‘flash flood’

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This article was published 14/06/2022 (1373 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A flash of rain and thunderstorms has led to even more flooding across Manitoba, causing at least one rural municipality to declare a local state of emergency.

Roads have been washed out and local infrastructure is struggling to handle the heavy rain that fell on the community of Austin over the last 24 hours.

The RM of North Norfolk (of which Austin is a part) declared a state of local emergency Tuesday, after Mayor Gerald Barber said the community had been “flooded out,” with reports of up to 120 millimetres of rain. (Social media posts pushed the number even higher, to 150 mm in some cases.)

“It’s a flash flood basically… Our lift stations are really struggling to keep up, so there’s the danger of the sewers backing up,” Barber told the Free Press Tuesday. “We’ve got a lot of pumps running and we’re just trying to do what we can.”

Barber said the RM (located between Portage la Prairie and Carberry) is working to retrieve people in rural areas who have only one road into their property and are now stranded, and provide sandbags to Austin (population of approximately 420), while warning the farming community of MacGregor to the east of possible rushing water headed its way.

“Highway ditches between Austin and MacGregor are full because of the water breaking out of drainage ditches, and eventually it’ll come to MacGregor and pass,” the mayor said. “It’s working its way east through the municipality… We will be starting to make some dikes as we see the need.”

The state of emergency was declared in part so residents can apply to the province for funding for repairs; the RM plans to apply to help repair damages, as well.

Some of the most devastating damage, Barber said, was to hundreds of acres of farmland, with crops that have been lost to the sudden summer storm, after a difficult spring already delayed seeding.

“When you get that much rain, in a short period of time, and your systems are already full of water, it’s just a disaster,” he said. “There’s nothing that’s going to be able to control it.”

To the southwest, Souris Glenwood Golf Club was fully booked with a week of special events, until flooding from nearby Elgin Creek overtook much of the greenery, manager Bob Warden said.

“We were here to open as usual at 8 a.m. this morning, and we were shocked to see that the river is just flowing like crazy,” he said Tuesday.

Two of the bridges dotting the golf course have been washed away. Warden hoped staff and volunteers can clean up in time to reopen Wednesday at reduced hours, and be back in the full swing of things in time for Father’s Day, but it all depends on Mother Nature.

“We’ll fix it up to top shape once we can get at it, but it’s just a matter of when we can get at it is the question,” he said. “Because we don’t know how much more rain is coming.”

Unfortunately for those hardest hit, Tuesday’s rainfall likely won’t be the last the week has to offer, Environment and Climate Change Canada meteorologist Terri Lang said.

“It looks like everybody will be getting some rain across southern Manitoba,” she said. “Again, with those western areas probably taking the brunt of it, but it looks like everybody’s going to be in on it, at least for the next couple of days.”

The showers are coming from a large low pressure centre covering most of the Prairie provinces, which first formed in the United States and hit southern Manitoba on Monday.

After a brief break, another bout of rain is on the way Wednesday evening into Thursday. Manitobans should do what they’ve been doing all spring: prepare their homes for the possibility of flooding, Lang said.

Winnipeg’s spring season was bookended by snow and rain, and Environment Canada’s final precipitation numbers show it. The city logged more than double its average precipitation for the season (March-May), making it the fifth-wettest spring on record in 150 years.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca