Cleanup ‘staggering’ as severe storm slams Whiteshell, Kenora

Chainsaws buzzed around Darren James on Tuesday while seasonal residents cleaned up and assessed damage from a severe storm that hit part of Whiteshell Provincial Park one day earlier.

Broken or uprooted trees fell on James’s trailer and cabana, flattened a storage shed and destroyed septic tanks when the storm rumbled through Whispering Pines campground, just west of the Manitoba-Ontario boundary, Monday afternoon.

“There were probably between 30 and 40 trees broken just on my site here. It’s a real mess,” James said while he took a break from the cleanup. “The work in front of everybody out here for the next weeks and months, it’s staggering to know how much there is to do out here. It’s just changed everything.”

The storm caused flash flooding and power outages, and prompted a tornado warning in Kenora and cottage areas in northwestern Ontario.

James, who lives in Winnipeg, wasn’t at Whispering Pines when the storm hit. He felt emotional when he arrived Monday and saw the extent of the damage.

“We’ve done a lot of renovations. When we left Sunday afternoon I looked back and thought, ‘Wow, does it ever look good. We’ve come a long way,’” he said.

“When we got here (Monday), it was just unfathomable how much destruction there was. In the grand scheme of things, we’re somewhat lucky because it could have been way worse.”

James said he’s grateful for fellow seasonal campers at Whispering Pines, who’ve been helping their neighbours in the aftermath of the storm.

“Everyone is running around from site to site today to get the damage cleaned up,” he said. “I’m really grateful for the whole group of friends out here. I couldn’t have done this by myself.”

Environment Canada meteorologist Chloe Katsademas said pea- to marble-sized hail was reported near Rennie, while loonie-sized hail and 94 millimetres of rain were reported in Kenora.

The Northern Tornadoes Project is investigating wind damage in the Kenora area.

James’s Winnipeg home and his pickup truck were damaged during a hail storm in mid-June, two years after his roof had to be redone and vehicles fixed following a similar storm.

“The hits keep on coming. That’s two new roofs in three years for us, and now this out here,” he said. “You kind of think maybe we’re done with all the bad luck.”

The mid-June storm flooded streets and basements, and led to more than 24,000 damage claims to Manitoba Public Insurance, mostly due to hail.

Winnipeg city council’s executive policy committee approved a motion Tuesday to seek disaster financial assistance from the provincial government. The extent of damage to city property was unclear.

The city will ask that residents and businesses be allowed to seek financial aid, if eligible. It was not known how many were affected.

The province launched a disaster aid program in response to heavy rain in western and southern Manitoba in June. Severe flooding occurred in several communities, including Dauphin, Swan River, Stonewall and Ashern, while large areas of farmland were inundated.

Members of the Canadian Armed Forces and volunteers from disaster aid organizations are assisting recovery efforts in western Manitoba’s Parkland region.

Municipalities continue to assess damaged roads and other infrastructure before submitting disaster assistance claims to the province.

“It will be into the fall before we get a final tally about what went on and what had to be repaired. It’s a long process,” said Wes Taplin, reeve of the Rural Municipality of Rockwood, north of Winnipeg.

Frequent rainfall hasn’t helped.

“We seem to be getting rain just about every third day. For the farmers, nothing is drying up,” Taplin said.

Meanwhile, flood preparations continue in some western communities, including Brandon, Minnedosa and Sioux Valley Dakota Nation.

About a dozen City of Brandon workers and volunteers built a sandbag dike across Dave Barnes’s driveway to protect his home from the rising Assiniboine River, which is expected to peak between July 11 and 15.

Measuring 0.6 metres (two feet) high, the sandbag dike seals a gap in a clay berm that Barnes had built around his home on the east side of Brandon in 2017, after significant floods in 2011 and 2014. He was appreciative of the help.

“I’m feeling very optimistic. The city has been so supportive and they’re on top of it here,” Barnes said. “When I came to Brandon in 1979, I was immediately struck by the volunteer attitude and reality of this community. It’s a city, but it maintains the small-town desire to pitch together and volunteer. I love my city.”

His Rosser Avenue home is within city limits but outside of Brandon’s diking system, which has been closed or topped up in some spots. The province has projected a peak of up to 360.7 metres, below the record of 361.28 metres in 2014.

Barnes said he expects water to infiltrate his basement. His home is about 400 metres from the Assiniboine.

“It’s starting to get wet down there, but in full flood, when the ground water rises with the floodwater, the basement walls get leaky and I have to sump pump that basement out,” he said.

“In 2014, we totally survived. I never had more than two inches (five centimetres) of water on my basement floor — kept it pumped out at all times — and now we’re prepared to do that again.”

Some areas were still without power Tuesday afternoon after severe storms hit southwestern Manitoba Sunday night and early Monday.

About 100 customers near Wawanesa had been without power since about 1 a.m. Monday, Manitoba Hydro’s outage map showed. Strong winds and trees took out power lines and poles.

Hydro spokesman Peter Chura said the Crown corporation does not yet have an estimated cost for storm damage to the system this spring and summer.

It’s also too soon to say how rainfall in June and July could affect power generation.

“We are seeing our reservoirs start to recover from previous years of low water and drought, but we can’t predict what will happen the rest of the summer and fall, or how financial forecasts may be affected,” Chura said.

— With files from Carol Sanders

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca