There are another 40 plus photos on the link to show you even a blink’s worth of the damage and danger.. but more is coming to thousands as pumps are breaking and a area that was in the 1920’s a lake has a real risk of having 3 meters of water come pouring in to fill that lake base back up..
For thousands of families and thousands of business, the SHTF and hard.. while some MIGHT have water damage insurance, most will not have over land flood insurance and that means that this “act of god” will not be covered.. most will not have their extras if covered at high enough rates to begin to cover “2021” covid prices and I wince at what the recovery “covid/flood/supply chain” 2022 costs will be.. even those buildings standing but under a meter of water with fully flooded basements will need rip outs to the studs and rebuilds.
Now we widen our view moving to the businesses themselves.. their stock will be considered damaged and won’t be saleable and restocking (well we will get to restocking and roads just a bit down this post) while they will be strong at the beginning, they will soon find their shelves empty and while right now in the past 2 days most peaple are still in shock and in “help” mode..
In the next days, weeks and months, as the damage truly set in, as the mental health struggles, as peaple realize that there is no job to go to.. no paycheck coming in, that it takes months to even begin to get insurance claims moving as that shock wears off and a disaster form of PTSD and the daily struggle and grind wears peaple down, that help mode is going to be less in focus..
Take whatever help is being offered, and if you are in a home with space and are uneffected, sit down with your family and have a very real talk about if you have friends or family or depending the ability to offer a space in your home to help the displaced.. even if its just a place to park the moterhome and plug in etc
The power is off as is the heat and the temps are dropping at night, and its not like folks can just go to the local hotels, they are in the same place and there is a lack of space.. community centers that normally be opened up for warming are reporting in.. no, flooded, no power, no heat..
If you have the time to do so and have not done so, get those back packs ready, get your bug out kits ready, if for some reason calling it that “does not sound right” just get those evac bags and ideally backbags for each member of the family ready..
Now we get to really bad news.. the roads.. so many roads are closed, multiple mud slides, roads and bridges and train tracks are down.. I personally expect that a huge focus will be on getting the trains back up and running as they are the powerhouse for moving goods.. Which is not to say there will not be work on the other roads, for those from away..
In case you are wondering why I think the trains will be the focus, because without the trains, the goods and resupply from the port (which was already insanely backlogged) will not just not be supplying BC but it will not be sending goods to alberta,, Sask and MB and yes.. supplies can be brought up from the states to a point and across the great lakes from ontario.. BUT all the supplies and ships at the Vancouver port is not going to just suddenly pop up on the other side of canada at the eastern ports for off loading.. So my friends and family in alberta, please do not panic buy but it might be a good idea to just make sure some of your favorite SHELF stable foods are topped up if you are low on them.
In a nut shell about half the province is cut off from the other half.. the whole most populated area of the province (including the port, the resupply system and millions) are cut off from the rest of canada by road) you can leave one way by sea, and you can fly out but even that is going to be limited at least for a little while..
The flooding is covering some of the best and most productive farm land, the dairy’s are flooded, the crop land flooded, huge sections of one of two of our fruit production lands are either flooded, or damaged.. all the hundred of thousands of chickens and turkeys in their massive buildings did not get out, they are dead.. that is going to effect not only now but a whole raising cycle of all kinds and types of food production. That is the future.. which for most is not top of mind..
Update “Fraser Valley farmers supply 50 per cent of all B.C.’s eggs, chickens and dairy products. There are 45,000 dairy cows in the valley, and each chicken farm has around 25,000 birds.”
50 percent of all BC eggs, chickens and dairy, worse then I thought.
Right now, its all about the here, this moment.. and empty shelves.. ( I copied this from facebook, I can not tell you if its real or not but I believe it is)
Its the tip of the iceburg..
My heart goes out to those effected.. I hope that when BC asks for help from the feds, they get it.. they are going to need it.. I hope that all of reach out and find a way to give a helping hand in whatever way we can. Its going to be a very long 2022 and a very hard lean christmas for tens of thousands of families and then some..
Just another Day on the Farm 
Gosh, I didn’t even know this has happened Val, are you, the husband and all the critters ok?
How did this happen, is it just a case of torrential rain and the environment just not being able to cope with so much water?
Hi Silver, we are fine, we live in ontario, so cental canada, closer to the east coast, this is happening in BC (which is where Hip Roof barn lives, Nicola lives and so does ValB and more that read the blog including my one aunt/uncle and a number of 1st and 2nd cousins.. They got a crazy amount of rain a very short time frame and it has flooded out the rivers, caused massive slides and basicly cut off 2/3rds of the province of BC from its major city Vancouver, which just happens to be the West coast port that supplies about half of canada.. its a mess and its still happening it will be a while yet before we will even understand what all has went wrong as they are not at peek and are expecting even more rain system tomorrow.. no, the system and build up and the dams are not built to cope with this much water in this short of time frame
Oh my goodness. I hope everyone is as ok as they can be. Thank you for giving me the context of what has happened.
Fingers crossed that the pumps hold, the ones that went, we know that two cities are flooded, we know that the roads are down, that the rail line for the trains is land slided out.. but what everyone is holding their breath at is if those pumps go.. if they do that whole sections of a very large city built on a drained lake is about to become at a min 9 feet under water and a lake again.. while the humans can get out.. we are already looking at hundred of thousands of dead livestock and it will be even worse if those pumps goes.. the rescues will not let anyone try and bring their livestock out.. they are to just leave them.. brutal..
Yes, we have already seen here in Europe what can happen if things flood quickly:( https://www.carehome.co.uk/news/article.cfm/id/1653524/Disabled-care-home-residents-drown-in-Germanys-floods
I am so sorry for them, its certainly coming as a shock to many at what water/mud slides can do damage wise and how fast they can cut things off.. there is a reason we have a big canoe tucked into the yard, we live on a flood plain.. now in 102 years our house and yard have never flooded, fields and pastures yes, house and house yard no.. but its still a good idea to have a boat if you live in a flood plain.. and big enough for the humans, the dogs and at least a bit of gear..
That’s very sensible, better to be safe than sorry.
Yes the whole lower mainland is technically part of the pacific delta…crazy. Getting the livestock out, some smaller places did…but the reality is there is nowhere to get them out to, no passable roads, not enough trucks to move that much livestock…the system has collapsed. If they manage to get rail back up and running they are already terribly backlogged with grain. So this will affect farmers in other provinces who expect to sell their grain, much of it gets transported to the lower mainland to be shipped.
It was suggested to me ‘oh well we’ll just get grocery from Alberta. Alberta cannot feed BC. They need their supply for them and most people don’t realize Alberta gets they bulk of their goods from BC. Also had someone say ‘oh they can just ship to Prince Rupert and offload there’. No. Rupert cannot accommodate the traffic, and they are still in the process of building their deep water port for the big ships.
‘You can go down through the US and bring it back up’. Technically, yes. Is you can get across the border, if the goods aren’t time sensitive….but at a huge cost.
I feel almost sick at this. It boggles my mind how people simply do not understand – how precarious the supply chain is. Even up here they don’t get that their food comes to the grocery store every single day by truck. Every single day. They’re hoping to open highway 3 first (the crows nest) but no timeline. They’re also talking about designating it for essential travel only (trucks, medical etc). The federal govt has offered the military. We need it.
This will get worse before it gets better.
All of the above and that is why I woke up at 3 am and could not go back to sleep.. so all of the above! Yes it going to get alot worse before it gets better, 2022 is going to be a long slog..
So terribly sad.
Its massive, right now the peaple are in the “now” and the shock in the face, but its going to be a long term issue, we are talking 9 effected highways in multiple spots, we are talking two trains derailed into and down mountain rivers, plus track in a number of places, we are talking about massive amounts of farmers and hundred of thousand of animals and dead stock in the water.. So far, its three cities gone.. Its massive..