Mission resident Emmery Rosales awoke to the sound of water pooling outside her townhouse door early Saturday morning.
“There was so much water flowing into this room that it was able to actually knock over my baby’s crib,” describes Rosales.
She quickly ran to grab her children, taking them upstairs to her neighbour’s to seek shelter from the flood. Within a few minutes, water had taken over Rosales’s entire unit, and a glass- sliding door had been pushed into her home. Despite the immense damage, she says she’s grateful her family escaped unharmed.
Heavy rainfall Saturday morning triggered flash flooding, tearing through nearly a dozen homes on McRae Avenue in Mission. It started when a culvert plugged with debris at a nearby creek sent water pouring into nearby properties.
“I can’t believe how much damage there is from water. There was so much water pressure that it blew this glass door right through the house.”
The water was so powerful the runoff pushed another homeowner’s car right into her garage door.
Darlene Biero’s car was three- quarters of a metre over the plugs on the walls.
“Looked out front and my car was floating. Just devastating. It looked like New Orleans to us, just everything floating.”
Some homeowners are moving out temporarily, others are dealing with ripped up floor boards, washrooms and rooms caked up with mud. Some residents are blaming the District of Mission, claiming neighbours had been warning the District about the culvert.
“This wasn’t anything that we could have prepared for,” says Tracy Kyle, Director of Engineering for the District of Mission.
Environment Canada had issued a warning about an extreme rainfall event, but Kyle says the District was caught off guard by the sheer scope of the rainfall.
“We did do our due diligence and monitor all of the creeks and culverts on a regular basis. In fact they were done within the last month. Unfortunately, it was such a huge rainfall event that occurred in such a short period which caused this situation.”
For the Rosales family, it will likely take a long time before life can get back to normal. Cleanup efforts are not an easy task with no content insurance, and items of sentimental value destroyed by the powerful flood can never be bought.
“How do you put a price on some things? My daughter’s first toy for Christmas, wedding photos. Personal stuff that time gives you, you can’t get that back,” says Emmery’s husband Geoff Hackett as he tries to salvage what little remains for his family.
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