‘It’s incredibly dangerous work’: Abbotsford Fire details dangers of flood evacuations

Since a rainstorm across southern B.C. left thousands stranded, search and rescue teams have been tirelessly at work conducting challenging evacuations from flood-affected areas.

In Abbotsford, for example, once someone stuck trapped by a flood calls E-Comm 911, they are put into a dispatch queue for the local police department. Using the information from the caller, Abbotsford Police try to prioritize “Who’s in the most critical position?”

Abbotsford Fire and Rescue Chief Darren Lee explains that depending on where the caller is calling from, the file is assigned to either the Central Fraser Valley Search and Rescue or Chilliwack SAR.

SAR then creates a rescue plan which includes finding a way to reach the caller.

But Lee adds there are a number of barriers crews need to think of first.

“When they go by boat, the water could be very deep, or actually very shallow. So they have to drag their boats over roadways … where water’s flowing. So they have to navigate swift water and standing water and there’s fences and things like that underneath what they’re navigating,” Lee explains.

“Then, when they get up to the house, they do an assessment. They want to make sure that they don’t get put themselves in a bad position … if the water is moving around the property or something like that.”

Once crews reach the person they are rescuing, the person being assisted will be told to wear a Personal Flotation Device and will be helped into a boat, “whether that’s stepping off a porch or stepping out of a second-storey window into the boat, depending on the topography, where the propertie’s at and maybe they picked them up out of a driveway or something like that.”

But in the most dangerous and remote rescues, that’s when a helicopter will be used.

“There’s two styles: there’s hoist machines where they … can lower a rescuer down, they put the person in a harness, bring them up and bring them into the helicopter and then fly them to safety,” Lee says. “Or a longline machine where they the rescuer dangles on essentially a rope. And the helicopter pilot puts the rescuer down and they put the person in the harness and then … they actually ride outside the helicopter to safety.”

Simple to say that the work SAR crews do during floods is dangerous work, Lee says especially with the power of moving water and hazards that can come up.

For what’s in the water? Lee says crews do not know.

“So all of our rescuers go through a decontamination process. Once they’re done, they were dry suits, they wear helmets, so that we can protect them as much as possible. So there’s kind of a whole process to it to get them to a collection point.”

Related Articles:

• Dozens remain in Abbotsford Sumas Prairie area despite evacuation order

• Flood-affected Abbotsford not in the clear but mayor optimistic as Fraser River levels drop

• ‘Nothing is worth your life’: Abbotsford mayor pleads with people to evacuate Sumas Prairie

During a press conference, Wednesday, Abbotsford Police Department Chief Const Mike Serr said there were still about 40 people who did not evacuate their properties in the Sumas Prairie despite an evacuation order and dire warnings from officials.

While the vast majority have left, some “have chosen not to leave that area, which is concerning,” Serr said.

“We’re still asking anyone in the Sumas Prairie to leave, to follow the evacuation order. I know some people have seen that water is receding in certain areas. But I can tell you that this is still a dynamic situation. We’re still monitoring the river levels very closely. We know that this is not over, and this can change very quickly,” he said.

The local state of emergency continues to evolve and the city will keep issuing updates as they become available.

– With files from Monika Gul