The Chronicle Herald (Provincial)
Evacuees waiting for ice jam to melt
Residents of the Fort Mcmurray area being evacuated for the second time in four years will have to wait for the now 24-kilometre-long ice jam causing major flooding to melt, the Alberta government said Tuesday.
At least 13,000 residents of Fort Mcmurray were forced to leave their homes beginning Sunday as water levels on the Athabasca River rose as much as six metres.
Since Sunday, the Clearwater River has risen threequarters of a metre, and an ice jam 38 kilometres long on the Peace River threatens Fort Vermillion and nearby communities. States of local emergency remain in effect in Fort Mcmurray and Mackenzie County.
“This is a very serious situation. Ice jam floods are very unpredictable, and conditions can change quickly with little warning. There is no reasonable engineering solution to unlock the ice jams at this point — we have to rely on warm weather to soften the ice,” said Environment and Parks Minister Jason Nixon at a news conference Tuesday.
The ice jams are melting and breaking ice downstream under sunny conditions, however, said Colleen Walford, river forecaster at Environment and Parks.
Josh Knelson, reeve of Mackenzie County, where at least 451 people have been evacuated, said that in some areas, there was no realistic way to prevent flooding by sandbagging because of the size of ice jams.
“It's merely just begging the good Lord to have mercy on us,” said Knelson.
Nixon said the province was satisfied that it and the municipalities had the resources to bring the situation under control without direct help from the federal government.
Don Scott, mayor of the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, said while the possibility of military intervention has been considered, it would not work.
“It's the sheer size of the ice jam itself that prevents the military from using explosives,” said Scott.
Scott called it a “one-inone-hundred-year flood,” and encouraged Albertans to donate to the Red Cross.
“Basically, we're going to be waiting on mother nature for a while.”
The flooding has led to evacuation orders for some residents of Fort Mcmurray, Fort Vermilion and Tallcree First Nation at Beaver Ranch.
Shane Schrieber, managing director of the Alberta Emergency Management Agency, said that safe, separate accommodations such as hotels, motels and work camps were accommodating evacuees, rather than communal emergency shelters, to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Nixon said there was enough capacity, and asked evacuees to keep a safe distance from others.
“We know that a flooding event during the COVID-19 response is having exceptional impacts on people,” said Nixon. Municipalities and the province will work to cover the cost of accommodations and food, he said.
Some evacuees are staying with friends and families in homes, but evacuees registering at the Oil Sands Discovery Centre or the Casman Centre have been asked to practise physical distancing and exercise caution.
The rural municipality of Wood Buffalo has also issued a mandatory evacuation order for Draper, Longboat Landing, Waterways, Ptarmigan Trailer Park and the Taiga Nova Eco-industrial Park, and the entire lower townsite of Fort Mcmurray, except for the Northern Lights Regional Health Centre and Grayling Terrace.
The area surrounding the Northern Lights Regional Health Centre is being fortified with sandbags to mitigate flood risk.
Mackenzie County has issued a mandatory evacuation order for residents within the Hamlet of Fort Vermilion who reside east of 50th Street, north of the golf course, River Road, and Boreal Housing and all of North Vermilion.
Fort Mcmurray and Alberta Health Services have issued a boil water advisory for all of Fort Mcmurray and rural hamlets of Anzac, Draper, Gregoire Lake Estates, Fort Mcmurray First Nation 46, and Saprae Creek Estates.
The Peace River flood has also caused a disruption in the water supply for Fort Vermilion.