Some communities in southern Manitoba are still preparing for more flood impacts, while others are beginning to assess the damage after another storm moved through the region this week.
The city of Powerview-Pine Falls has set up barricades to protect its water treatment plant, Deputy Mayor Lorie Finkbeiner told CBC News.
The rural municipality of St. Clements, who held an emergency meeting Tuesday after Environment Canada issued warnings of rain and wind in much of southern Manitoba, had no reports of damage around the southern Lake Winnipeg basin, the coordinator said. Freelancer Tyler Freeman.
The town was lucky: the waves on Lake Winnipeg were not as high as the province feared they could reach, he said.
The only problematic point was near Patricia beach, where the municipality installed a bomb and the properties were not damaged.
In the rural town of Gimli, a section of Highway 222 was closed after an inflated stream damaged the road.
“Now that the rain has stopped, I think our drainage systems will be able to handle it,” said Mayor Lynn Greenberg.
A whirlwind turns Wednesday in a swollen stream near where it passes through a culvert under Highway 222 in the rural town of Gimli. (Submitted by Andy Blicq)
Despite the wash on Highway 222, access to the highway in the area has not been significantly affected, Greenberg said.
The Department of Public Works of the municipality has not yet made an assessment of the damage.
“The worst thing right now is that farmers can’t get into the field and they’re already behind, more than a month, in planting,” Greenberg said.
Farmers need about four to five days of dry weather, he said.
A spokesman for Lakeside Rural Township said the evacuation order for residents around Lake Dauphin has ended and all residents of Ocher Beach and Crescent Cove have returned.
Strong northerly winds raised the water level on the south side of Lake Dauphin, which lies east of Dauphin and northeast of Mount Riding.
The municipality is still determining how many properties were damaged by the lake wave.
The Winnipeg River is now a “huge, huge basin”
To the southeast, the Whiteshell region continues under an evacuation order. CBC News has requested an update from the provincial government on water levels in the Winnipeg River system, which have continued to rise, but at a slower pace in recent days.
“A huge, huge basin has been created,” said DJ Seales, standing by the swollen Winnipeg River at the Seven Sisters generating plant on Wednesday.
DJ Seales owns Barrier Bay Resort and is president of the North Whiteshell Business Association. (Gary Solilak / CBC)
Seales owns Barrier Bay Resort and is president of the North Whiteshell Business Association. All the resorts in its forest pass are closed due to the water that has risen slightly in recent days.
His accommodation has managed to remain relatively unharmed, although the same cannot be said of his fate. Some Winnipeg River owners have been even worse off.
“Any dock is gone for just about anyone,” Seales said. “Then there is the damage on the river bank, this is where ours is happening. We are losing all kinds of property just by the water that washes it.”
Seales says so far most of the perimeters of sandbags and dikes from other hostel owners are holding up.
“We do it on a daily basis and see if it stays that way and it looks like it is,” he said. “It simply came to our notice then [we’re] hopeful and confident that it will be so [hold up]. “
DJ Seales said the swollen Winnipeg River has spilled onto roads and land in and around the Seven Sisters Generating Station, cutting new paths through the surrounding woods. (Gary Solilak / CBC)
Seales suggested that guests with reservations in the area approaching should be patient if faced with cancellations. Guests who manage to enter a lodge if they open in the near future should also be prepared for a different experience.
“The big piece will be later,” he said. “It may not look the same as in other years because it is repaired, cleaned, and so on.”
The forest lake could go up
Across the border in Ontario, the city of Kenora issued an alert that water levels in the forest lake could rise another 15 to 21 centimeters next week.
“We are concerned about rising water levels on many of the urban roads, some of which have seen significant increases in water levels over the past 24 hours,” the city said in a press release.
The city advises residents of Sedesky Road, Wildwood Drive, West Bay Road and Second West Bay Road to check their homes for possible flooding.