A state of emergency and an evacuation order have been issued for Little Qualicum River Estates after a landslide heavily damaged a house and sent a man to hospital.
The man was trapped after the landslide knocked his house off its foundation and it partially collapsed. Firefighters had to dig through debris to get to the man.
He was transported to Nanaimo Regional Hospital with non-life threatening injuries and is expected to be released in the near future.
Firefighters went in through an opening in the back of the house and tried to find the trapped man. Using saws and handtools, they cut through several layers of house debris to get at him, said Dashwood Fire Chief Nick Acciavatti.
“It probably took 45 minutes to an hour to effect a rescue,” said Acciavatti.
The man had been in the basement, his wife on the ground floor, when the landslide slammed into the house.
The wife was able to escape on her own.
Emergency officials knocked on the doors of all houses in the area, above and below the slide, and told residents to leave.
Heavy rain has made the terrain unstable.
People living in the area have been sent to an emergency reception centre at the Qualicum Beach Civic Centre where social services will assist them.
The Nanaimo Regional District said a geotechnical assessment is underway to determine the full impact of the landslide.
The district and the Snuneymuxw First Nation are also working on an evacuation alert for residents in the Raines Road area.
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An evacuation order has been issued for areas of Courtenay near waterways as flood waters continue to rise.
Residents in the areas adjacent to the Tsolum, Puntledge and Courtenay Rivers are being advised of imminent danger due to flooding and being told to move to higher ground.
City staff and emergency responders are going door to door in the affected area, according to the evacuation order issued at 2:15 p.m. on the City of Courtenay’s website.
Comox Valley RCMP are assisting with the evacuation.
A state of emergency has been declared at the Tseshaht First Nation in Port Alberni and 22 homes were evacuated Tuesday as the Somass River continued to rise. Dozens of people are taking shelter in the reserve’s gymnasium which is at higher ground, said chief councillor Hugh Braker.
Some handicapped people were evacuated with the help of Port Alberni firefighters.
Highway 4 which runs through the reserve is closed as it’s covered in almost two metres of water. Hector Road is also closed and people are being diverted at McCoy Lake Road.
“[Wednesday] morning the First Nation requested help with sandbagging and evacuating,” said Port Alberni fire chief Tim Pley. “The city has provided 3,000 sandbags. The First Nation has done a great job taking care of their own needs.”
Two other areas are also being affected by flooding including homes in the Ferguson Road area and a neighbourhood off Hector Road, Pley said. No evacuation has been ordered but some people have left on their own.
Dozens of people are working to pile up sandbags to prevent further flooding but Braker said the reserve desperately needs another 5,000 sandbags. It has asked the province’s Emergency Preparedness B.C. for help.
“The river is continuing to rise, it has not stopped at all or even slowed down,” Braker said, adding it’s at historical high levels he hasn’t seen in his lifetime. “We're really in a crisis situation here.”
Other members of the reserve were working to help remove furniture and items from the floors of homes to prevent personal items from being destroyed.
“There’s a lot of stress,” Braker said. “I know of one person I spoke to minutes ago who believed his house is going to go underwater at any moment.”
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Alarms were sounding at the Comox Lake dam in Courtenay today as B.C. Hydro spilled water downstream with the hope of avoiding more flooding.
The alarm is used to warn anything downstream that water is being released.
“We’ve had about 250 millimetres of rain hit above the Comox Lake reservoir over 48 hours,” said Stephen Watson, spokesman for B.C. Hydro.
“The volume of water inflows into the reservoir hit a 50-year return period on Tuesday,” he said. “We have backed off discharges from the dams as much as possible each morning for the high tides to limit downstream flooding.”
The Comox Lake reservoir has risen 2.5 metres in the past two days, he said.
Courtenay Mayor Larry Jangula says a high tide at about 9 a.m. did not cause flooding in low-lying areas as emergency personnel had feared. Another high tide is expected at 4:40 p.m.
Now the utility is releasing water from the dam with the hope the river system downstream — including the Puntledge, Tsolum, Browns, and Courtenay rivers — “will be able to flush the water out to sea without causing flooding,” Jangula said.
On Tuesday, flooding in Courtenay led the mayor to declare a state of emergency, which allows authorities to order travel bans or evacuations.
The city had closed streets and trails in low-lying areas as well as the Lewis Park recreational facility.
Some roads remain closed because of impassable pools of water along the Courtenay River and other low-lying areas.
Meanwhile, in Campbell River, the hourly volume of water inflows into the Upper Campbell Reservoir/ Buttle Lake hit a 30-year return period, Watson said.
“We backed off considerably for the morning high tide and managed to keep the river within its banks,” Watson said. “It will be around bank-full throughout the day.”
B.C. Hydro is working closely with the cities of Courtenay, Campbell River and Emergency Management B.C.
More rain and wind storms are expected to hit Vancouver Island today and Thursday on the heels of storms that caused flooding, power outages and downed trees.
