Stubbornly-high level at Okanagan Lake
Heavy rains in recent weeks have been pumping up the stubbornlyhigh level of Okanagan Lake, says the person in charge of managing it.
As of noon Thursday, the lake surface was at 342.76 metres above sea level – 28 centimetres above full pool, according to Environment Canada data.
“It’s definitely impacting people already, certainly some of the people in some of the lower areas, maybe some older homes that weren’t built to the flood-construction standard,” said Shaun Reimer, section head for public safety and protection with the Ministry or Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development.
It’s the third time in four years the lake has surpassed full pool.
“People are frustrated and I get it,” said Reimer. “I’m frustrated as well.”
With the spring melt just about complete – Reimer expected the snow pillow at Mission Creek to be out of work today – it’s rain that’s causing problems now.
“We’re in a positon here where it’s like the lake wants to level off. We’re at that time of year. In fact, the lake was levelling off a weekand-a-half ago for days at a time, and then all of a sudden we got that big, weekend extended rain,” said Reimer.
The land surrounding Okanagan Lake is saturated, he continued, so “pour any water on it and it makes its way down and runs into the lake.”
But barring an unusually wet July, Reimer believes the lake is probably at or near its peak level now. To help, on Thursday he nudged up the outflow from the Penticton dam from 72 to 75 cubic metres per second, which will still only drop the lake of “a fraction of a millimetre per day,” but is near a historical high of 78.
That increased flow has only added more water to the Okanagan River downstream, though, creating another safety risk on the banks around it.
“I really caution people about going near it,” said Reimer, whose primary directive is flood control, followed by protection of fisheries and agriculture.
Environment Canada hasn’t published rainfall totals for Penticton since mid-May, but the latest rain event Wednesday was enough to wash away the surface on part of the KVR Trail.
Crews have set up a detour through the Lakeview Cemetery while work is underway on the damaged section of the trail north of the cemetery to Carder Road.
City parks supervisor Todd White described the damage as minor.
“To be able to facilitate the repair, we needed to close the trail as users would not be able to safely pass through the work zone while the equipment is operational onsite,” he said in an email.
The work is expected to wrap up today. White was not aware of any other problems with localized flooding elsewhere in the city.