Evacuation alerts lifted as waters appear to be stabilizing
The outlook is optimistic for flood areas in the South Okanagan as mitigation efforts refocused on key spots this week.
Evacuation alerts for approximately 800 properties have been lifted over the past two days, with upwards of 200 evacuation alerts still in place and 72 evacuation orders remaining in the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen.
Osoyoos Lake has dropped nearly 30 centimetres since last week, Okanagan Lake is holding steady, and creeks and rivers appear to be stabilizing or drying up, according to Zoe Kirk, speaking in her capacity as information officer at the RDOS emergency operations centre.
“What that does is allows us to focus on areas of most and largest concern,” Kirk said.
Chief among them are the rural community of Twin Lakes about 30 minutes southwest of Penticton, where members of the Canadian military placed 18,000 sandbags Tuesday and Wednesday, and a stretch of the Tulameen River about six kilometres west of Keremeos, where four homes were placed under evacuation orders earlier this week.
Coral Brown, Twin Lakes resident and head of the Lower Nipit Improvement District, said the extra muscle was appreciated this week, but much more is still needed.
“I think it’s really important to realize there’s 54 places out here out of 70 properties that have been impacted in some way,” she said.
“For us, my husband and I, it’s impacting our pump house and our water supply. It’s not at our house yet, but it’s close.”
As someone who monitors lake levels for the improvement district, she had a piece of good news Thursday: “This morning was the first day since water started rising that (the lake level) did not go up.”
Three engineers were up and down the drainage area over the past week and determined the flood mitigation done earlier this year for Park Rill Creek would be able to take on the extra water flow from Twin Lakes, which is expected to eventually find its way to downstream Sportsmens Bowl just north of Oliver.
That area was one of the first to be hit by intense flooding this year, but flood mitigation works are already in place there and it’s believed they will be able to handle the additional water.
“Of course the last thing you want to do is add water to a compromised area and community, but the engineers felt it was the best option available and the armouring downstream from the pumping was stable enough and substantial enough to withstand the extra water,” said Kirk.
The draining will be “constantly monitored” she added, with pumping ramped up slowly to see how things go downstream.