EAGLE VALLEY
NEWS
Hiking options abundant in Sicamous area Page 6
Primeau tops Men’s Open tournament Page 7
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Vol. 53 No. 24 Sicamous, B.C., • 1.25 (HST included) • www.eaglevalleynews.com
Rapid rider: Malakwa’s Ricky McLain doesn’t let the washout at the east end of Cambie Solsqua Road deter his Thursday afternoon bike ride.
Photo by Lachlan Labere
High water causes havoc along Cambie Solsqua Road Eagle River levelling off: Evacuation alert rescinded for Sundance Road and area residents. By Lachlan Labere and Barb Brouwer Eagle Valley News
To say last week was a wet one around Sicamous is an understatement. With the melting snowpack and the pounding rains, normally quiet creeks became torrents rushing towards the Eagle River, which overflowed its banks in numerous spots along its winding path to Shuswap Lake. Residents along Cambie Solsqua Road received the worst of it. Wednesday afternoon, what’s known as Ylisto Creek rose, while the culvert going under the road became plugged. The end result was a massive washout that closed that end of the road for a few days. “I came home here at one o’clock yesterday (June 6), and I said to the guy that was giving me a ride home, I said, ‘well, I bet you this creek will be going over the road.’ By four o’clock it was going over the road,” said Whit Lee, while standing on a bank of riprap piled high to contain the creek. Lee said it wasn’t the first time the creek has overflown its banks at that spot.
“The whole mountainside came down and covered the road, right, and this creek here covered this…,” said Lee, pointing to the roughly 100 feet of flooded road in front of him. As Ylisto was flowing over the road, nearby Sims Creek was also becoming a concern for the Columbia Shuswap Regional District’s Shuswap Emergency Program (SEP). The creek was flowing high, with heavy mud and log debris beginning to collect, threatening to cause the creek to overflow its bank. In response, the CSRD, through SEP, issued an evacuation alert Wednesday evening to residents of Sundance Road, and residents along a section of Cambie Solsqua Road. Late Thursday afternoon, Sundance Road resident Vicki Krahn was down on Cambie Solsqua to pick her child up from the school bus. Krahn said an RCMP officer came around at 10:30 the night before with the alert as she and her family were getting ready for bed. She said they were prepared to leave, if they See Waterfront on page 2
Flooded: Cambie Solsqua Road resident Stan Heitman looks across his property that was largely submerged as of Thursday afternoon. Photo by Lachlan Labere