TORONTO -- An intense storm slamming the West Coast has left a trail of devastation and chaos in British Columbia, with flooding, mudslides and evacuation orders issued to try to ensure public safety.
On Tuesday, police in the city of Abbotsford issued an evacuation order for all of the Sumas Prairie to the Chilliwack border, saying “water levels are rising very quickly.”
Just before 12 p.m. ET, the local police department issued an “emergency evacuation, “saying all residents needed to “evacuate immediately if safe to do so.”
The entire city of Merritt was evacuated by officials on Monday, when floodwaters “inundated” bridges and shut down the local sewage treatment plant.
Torrential rain caused mudslides, flooding, and rockslides and forced highway closures between B.C.’s Lower Mainland and Southern Interior on Monday, with some homes in Merritt evacuated. An expanded evacuation order was issued after 10 a.m. local time urging nearby Nicola Valley community members to leave the area.
Dozens of homes in the district of Okanagan-Similkameen were evacuated Sunday night, and landslides and flooding hit Abbotsford, with several roads cut off as a result of the weather.
According to an update from BC Hydro on Tuesday, at the windstorm’s peak on Monday, approximately 126,000 customers were without power.
BC Hydro said power to about 56,000 customers was restored overnight, however, around 6,600 are still experiencing outages in the Lower Mainland and on Vancouver Island.
In the Interior, more than 13,600 customers remain without power.
Transportation has been stymied across parts of the provinces, with ferries and public transit routes cancelled and highways closed due to safety concerns around road and bank instability.
Photos and videos from across the province show the scale of the storm’s aftermath and the repercussions as rain continues to fall in some areas and evacuation orders continue to be issued.
Footage shows flooding covering residential streets in Langley Township, B.C. (@UnknownSaviour_via Storyful)
Footage shows fast-flowing waters carrying debris down the Fraser River. (Dan Pulsifer via Storyful)
