A wild weather night Wednesday, August 4, in Fraser Lake started with a plume of smoke and more lightning followed by heavy rain flooding the shopping mall.
Mayor Sarrah Storey said she first received a message of a possible fire on the north shore of Fraser Lake before 7:30 p.m. Shortly after, heavy rain started to fall.
Her mother-in-law with Autumn Services, a non-profit providing community supports, had phoned telling Storey they would need shop vacs as water had started to seep inside their building on Chowsunket Drive.
“I just thought this is a little bit of water; how bad can this be,” Storey said at first.
Her two sons had three friends over whom she did not want to send home until the rain stopped.
“It was so so severe, and there was so much lightning,” she said. “As the rain started going away, I sent the three boys and went over to the mall, and realized no, it wasn’t just a little bit of water. It was a lot of water, and it was everywhere.”
Starting from The Rusty Pitchfork and heading down the mall, the more water there was inside local businesses, including Canada Post and EveryBody Fitness.
Rainwater came from the roof and bubbled up through the ground soaking everything in its path.
Community members were quick, however, to lend a helping hand along with shop vacs and more.
“We have a really amazing community—we’re really lucky that way,” Storey said, noting she had put a call out for support on the Facebook page Heck Ya Fraser Lake & Area!
“Obviously, all communities know how to do that and get together, but it’s quite unique to see it in a small community. To see 20 to 30 people show up and mop up water for a couple of hours and try to save furniture and equipment and do all the things they do, it’s special also. “
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Cleanup efforts didn’t stop until around 10:30 p.m, when people started to call it a night and head home.
“We have two grocery stores in that mall, and there’s a little bit of competition probably, but you wouldn’t know that,” Storey added. “What’s really awesome was seeing the store owners that didn’t have any damage coming over and helping the store owners and the managers and staff that did.”
The morning after the storm, the community continued to show its support by donating dehumidifiers and fans to help dry things out.
At least one home is believed to have incurred flooding, and Storey said with all the groundwater, she would not be surprised if someone had water in their basement where there are drainage issues in the Village of Fraser Lake.
“It’s the long-term effect from water damage that’s really the concern,” she said.
Storey estimates within 45 minutes the storm had dumped more than two inches of rain in the community that started as an extremely hot day.
The Prince George Fire Centre (PGFC) said the two-hectare, lightning-caused fire was responded to by initial attack crews and is now classified as under control.
Within the past 24 hours, PGFC has had 11 new fires, six of which were in the Vanderhoof zone and all sparked by lightning, said communications specialist Sharon Nickel.
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