Homes and wineries near Oliver on alert for flooding

Excavating crews are working to keep Testalinden Creek near Oliver from overflowing its banks, while residents and a local winery remain under evacuation alert.

CC Jentsch Cellars winery has had an excavator and dump trucks working for eight days straight to keep the creek clear of debris, while crews from the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen work above and below Highway 97 to protect roads.

“The creeks in that area have jumped the banks in two locations and we are working to keep that from happening again,” said Dale Kronenbusch, emergency services supervisor for the regional district. “The excavators are pulling out the gravel that is coming down, otherwise it fills the bottom of the creek bed and flows right into the orchards and the fields.”

Fifteen properties, including CC Jentsch Cellars, remain under evacuation alert.

Nearby, Intersection Estate Winery was partly inundated last week and the middle section of the vineyard remains underwater.

“We’ve had a 100-year or 200year storm and the ground was already wet before the run-off started,” owner Bruce Schmidt said.

Whether a significant number of his 20,000 vines are damaged will depend on how quickly the water dissipates.

“We’ve never had standing water for more than two weeks before,” he said.

The more likely result is the water and silt deposits spur new growth points that will require “extreme pruning,” he said.

“Flooding is only one of many threats to a vineyard,” Schmidt said. “If you can’t handle this, you shouldn’t be a farmer.”

The threat of flooding and property damage has been a “nightmare” and things could get worse when the snow starts melting, Kronenbusch said. The combination of warm weather alternating with heavy rain is of particular concern.

“Unfortunately, we are not calling an end to spring freshet — in fact, it will probably go until the middle of next month,” he said. “What started the whole thing was a warm day, followed by rain on Thursday and Friday, and that sent water and debris all down the creek like crazy.”

The snowpack in Similkameen is 142 per cent of normal, according to the provincial River Forecast Centre, while temperatures are predicted to hit the mid-20s as soon as Thursday.

“By the end of the week we are expecting warmer weather, but even the last few nights the mountains are still getting fresh snow,” he said.

Meanwhile, the flood threat has been downgraded for parts of the southern Interior and northwestern B.C. The River Forecast Centre says flood watches are down to high streamflow advisories for the Nicola River near Merritt and for the Salmon River in the Shuswap, east of Kamloops. High streamflow advisories have also ended for the Kettle River in the Boundary region and the Bulkley River, and its feeders around Houston, Telkwa and Smithers in northwestern B.C.

In the northeastern part of the province, a flood warning remains in place for the Beatton River, and flood watches are still in effect for the Moberly, Halfway and parts of the Peace rivers.

Near Kelowna, attention is shifting to the level of Okanagan Lake, which the Central Okanagan Regional District says is just 35 centimetres below the flood mark, with much of the heavy snowpack still unmelted.

A news release from the regional district says if the lake surpasses the 343-metre level, it will begin to back up into Mission and Mill creeks, which run through downtown Kelowna, potentially causing severe flooding.