A pothole in the eastbound curb lane of Jubilee Ave. in Winnipeg is being blamed for flattening several tires and stranding a handful of motorists in a single day.
“I was driving along, going the speed limit, 50, and then bam,” said Valerie Chan about her experience driving home from work Friday evening.
“I felt something was wrong, and I do have that computerized light telling me that low pressure was suddenly on and I could feel the wheels were not driving very well, so BDI (Bridge Drive-In) was the closest place for me to turn in.”
After pulling into the parking lot and realizing both tires on the passenger’s side of her vehicle were flat, Chan pulled out her phone to call CAA, but noticed she wasn’t alone.
“It seemed like a little bit of a party,” Chan said.
“I walked around and realized there’s a bunch of people sitting in their vehicles, also on phones with multiple flat tires.”
One of those people was Daniel Minuk, who says he was coming home from dinner with his wife when both of his passenger-side tires were claimed by the pothole.
“It was a very, very violent drop,” Minuk said.
“There was probably five or six of us who had literally just had it happen to us in a very short span of time, who were in the parking lot, and there were already, I believe, three vehicles parked with flat tires in the parking lot as well.”
Both Minuk and Chan left their vehicles parked overnight. Minuk returned Saturday to put spares on his vehicle and drive it to a shop, while Chan came back to see her vehicle get hoisted onto the back of a truck and towed.
“The front passenger-side tire was completely busted, the rim was dented and the tire was actually shredded,” Minuk said.
“The back tire was completely flat, but the rim didn’t seem broken. But given the violent nature of what transpired, that’s why I want them to check the undercarriage.”
Both said they have already made a claim with MPI, but Minuk, a lawyer, says he intends to try to get the city to cover the deductible.
CAA Manitoba says it received seven calls about flat tires at the BDI between Wednesday and Saturday, four of which came in on Friday, but it can’t confirm whether or not those were because of the pothole.
By early afternoon Saturday, the city had erected pylons to keep people from driving over it.
Later in the day, the city told Global News crews would be going out Saturday evening to fix it.
A spokesperson added anyone who notices a problem can call 311, or report a pothole on the city’s website.
The city’s website also says anyone who sustains damage from potholes can either contact MPI or City Claims.
Should they decide to contact City Claims, people are told to provide a minimum of two estimates and arrange an appointment with an adjustor to see the damage.
“We know that in Manitoba it’s winter flows into pothole flows into construction season, so there’s not much I think the city could do, except be hypervigilant on every street, which is highly unlikely they can manage that,” Minuk said.
“It’s just the general concept of being careful when you’re driving and not taking a pothole for granted, because you never know how far down it actually goes.”
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