There is no longer a severe chance of flooding in Hope, while the district continues to warn residents to expect higher than normal Fraser and Coquihalla River flows.
“We expect both these rivers will continue to experience higher than normal flow rates for this time of year. We expect that these rivers will slowly reduce their flows over the next seven days. Therefore we do not expect any severe chance of flooding,” the Tuesday district update reads.
“The weather looks promising and the rivers depths didn’t really change that much on the Fraser River the past few days so that is a positive sign,” David Campbell, head of the BC River Forecast Centre, said in a Monday update. A high streamflow advisory is still in place from the forecast centre, which states the runoff from snow melt is expected to decline this week, with flows at the Hope gauge forecasted at 9,000 cubic metres per second (m3/s) later in the week. As of press time, the Hope gauge read 9,450 m3/s.
The early freshet has virtually erased the time buffer which normally occurs between the flooding and wildfire season, said Chris Duffy, executive director of Emergency Planning B.C.
“We used to see a period after flood season had pushed across the province where new grass growth in the spring would start to push up, giving us a bit of a breather between flood and fire season, but that doesn’t seem to be the case anymore,” said Duffy.
– With files from Barry Gerding
