Officials were warned two days before Oliver slide

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The RCMP notified the provincial government two days before Sunday’s catastrophic mudslide that Testalinden Lake might be flooding, but Victoria did not warn area residents or take action to stop a dam from collapsing.

An Osoyoos resident hiking near the lake Friday morning noticed the water was overtopping the earthen dam and contacted a local tourism office, which in turn alerted the police, RCMP Cpl. Dan Moskaluk told The Vancouver Sun.

"Our detachment staff dealt with this … report as a priority by immediately relaying this information onto a deemed-appropriate provincial partner, that being the Ministry of Forests, on Friday within minutes," Moskaluk said.

The RCMP informed the forests ministry because the hiker said the overflowing water was muddying a road beside the lake, which the police thought would be a forestry road.

"On the Monday [one day after the mudslide], the individual did go back to the tourism centre, and then came to our front counter. He asked us point blank: Did we pass that information on? And we said yes," Moskaluk added.

Minister of Public Safety Mike de Jong could not be reached for comment Wednesday evening to say what information the government received Friday, two days before the Testalinden Lake dam gave way, wiping out five homes near Oliver.

However, the Public Safety Ministry issued a statement Wednesday evening that said the facts regarding the call to the RCMP and the relayed information to the Ministry of Forests and Range office in Vernon are the subject of a review.

"It is not unusual for the Okanagan-Shuswap Forest District to receive reports of water related issues on backcountry roads at this time of the year (freshet)," the statement said. "The information delivered to the forests office about water on the road was apparently not characterized as an emergency and was therefore not acted on appropriately for the reality of the situation. That’s why we are reviewing what happened."

NDP MLA Mike Farnworth said Victoria issued no public warning last week, and he questioned whether the government even checked out the dam since it collapsed 48 hours after the tip was received.

"You would expect in a situation where there’s a report that there’s a dam – even a small dam – where there may be problems, that that should be checked out and investigated. It is straight negligence otherwise," Farnworth charged.

The government also refused to say Wednesday whether some of the water could have been gradually released late last week to prevent the dam from collapsing.

"Given this particular dam is part of an open investigation, we cannot comment further with respect to specific or hypothetical questions related to this dam," Ministry of Public Safety spokesman Brent Shepherd said in an e-mail.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Environment announced Wednesday that it will now start inspecting dams on a priority basis throughout B.C. as a result of the mudslide.

There are 1,985 dams throughout the province, 97 per cent of them privately owned. Just 39 are owned by the province, and about 11 by the federal government.

The majority of B.C.’s dams are not made of concrete, but are "earthfilled" – just like the privately owned, 80-year-old dam that failed near Oliver – according to a 1998 government report on dams.

"It is important to note that the probability of small dams failing can be much higher than larger dams due to the lack of owners’ resources resulting in poorer maintenance. Even a relatively small dam can have severe consequences in the event of a failure," said the 1998 Ministry of Environment Dam Safety Guidelines report.

The dam that gave way Sunday on Testalinden Lake is licensed to E&M Cattle Co. Ltd., which changed its name in 1968 to Elkink Ranch. Owner Ace Elkink did not return phone messages.

The current dam safety regulation, in effect since 2000, says maintenance is the responsibility of the dam owner, and the frequency of inspections is based on how the dam’s risk level is classified.

According to the Ministry of Environment website, more than 300 of B.C.’s 1,985 dams are classified as high or very high risk – meaning their failure would cause significant fatalities, economic losses or environmental damage.

The Testalinden Lake dam is not included in an online government list of dams deemed to be of high or very high risk.

Six properties remained on evacuation order Wednesday, while other residents along Testalinden Creek were on evacuation alert, said Mark Woods, community services manager for the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen.

Highway 97 reopened Wednesday, and the cleanup effort is continuing. The homes that are still deemed unsafe are at the top of the hill, near the mouth of Testalinden Creek.

UBC geological engineering Prof. Erik Eberhardt believes it would be cost- and time-prohibitive for the government to inspect every dam in B.C., and noted there have been few incidents of dams breaking in populated areas.

"It looks like [the Oliver dam failure] was almost a 100-year storm as they had three weeks of rainfall in an area that doesn’t have a lot of rain," he added.

It is not yet clear whether heavy rainfall was a factor in the dam failure, but this spring has been much wetter than usual in the south Okanagan.

Normal rainfall in the region for May 15 to June 15 is about 40 millimetres, while about 109 millimetres fell in the same period this year.

There is on average one dam failure each year in B.C., but they are usually very small, Shepherd said.

The 1998 ministry report listed examples of three previous dam failures in B.C.:

The ministry’s role with privately owned dams is to audit conditions and performance, as well as the licence-holder’s inspections and compliance with regulations.

Since 2003, audits were to be conducted every five or 10 years, depending on the dam’s risk classification.

tsherlock@vancouversun.com

lculbert@vancouversun.com

with a file from Jonathan Fowlie

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