Relentless rain prompts more evacuation orders as B.C. braces for 3rd consecutive storm
CBC
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The third in a series of increasingly powerful storms is approaching British Columbia while the province is still surveying damage across the Lower Mainland and southern Interior caused by prior weather events.
Cleanup is still underway after an atmospheric river system caused devastating flooding and fatal mudslides Nov. 13-15. Three more systems were since forecast to hit the province, the second of which forced more evacuation orders and road closures this weekend.
The third is expected to slam into B.C. later Tuesday, with officials warning it could be the worst one yet.
Environment Canada has issued a series of special weather alerts for much of B.C.'s southwest and coast, with up to another 100 millimetres of rainfall predicted for the Fraser Valley between Tuesday and Wednesday along with winds up to 60 km/h. Areas of Vancouver Island and the Central Coast could see as much as 200 millimetres of rain.
The Fraser Valley has borne much of the brunt of the flooding and late Sunday several more residents of Abbotsford were ordered to evacuate their homes due to the ongoing threat.
Crews in the city, including members of the Canadian military, worked through the night to pump water into tiger dams to try to hold back floodwaters from the Sumas River. A tiger dam is a series of water-filled tubes over a metre in height that are used to create a barrier.
"We are pumping about a billion gallons a day," said Abbotsford Mayor Henry Braun, speaking Monday on The Early Edition.
Braun said his "worst nightmare" is if the Nooksack River in Washington state breaches Abbotsford's dikes.
He said 17 kilometres of the city's dikes have been repaired and reinforced since they were damaged earlier this month, but the mayor is not positive it is enough to hold back the Nooksack.
"Once it breached, you had a three-storey wall of water," he said, referring to last time the U.S. river overflowed its banks and crossed the border.
Braun said as of Monday shortly before 8 a.m., water about 20 centimetres deep was already coming across the border and entering the Sumas Prairie area of Abbotsford, which was extensively flooded after the Nov. 13-15 storm.
Abbotsford city staff are in hourly contact with counterparts in Whatcom County across the border who are monitoring the Nooksack, said Braun.
On Sunday evening, the District of Hope, about 155 kilometres east of Vancouver, declared a state of local emergency and later placed homes on Riverview Drive on an evacuation alert.
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