More troops help Princeton shore up defenses, both rivers on flood watch
Posted November 28, 2021 1:39 pm.
Last Updated November 28, 2021 1:40 pm.
In Princeton, the military and an “army of volunteers” are shoring up the town’s defences against flooding from the Tulameen and Similkameen Rivers Sunday.
With both rivers on flood watch, Mayor Spencer Coyne says he’s cautiously optimistic the town has seen the worst of this storm, but he’s worried about what will come next week.
“Everybody’s a little on edge, to be honest. I mean, it’s hard not to be,” he tells CityNews.
“The river has gone up a little bit but nowhere to the extent that we were worried about. We’re more worried about Tuesday when that next system starts hitting us.”
There are now 70 troops in town filling and deploying sandbags, up from 30 last week.
3 days and about 50,000 sand bags later. My @3CdnDiv3DivCA soldiers did an incredible job reinforcing the #BCFloods defences in #PrincetonBC. An amazing job that any leader would be proud of. pic.twitter.com/nH1TqWgOBy
— Rob (@robhaddow) November 28, 2021
“When the Canadian Forces showed up in town, you could almost hear a collective sigh of relief. We’re sandbagging.
We’re trying to wall off the Tulameen, bringing up our defences at least three feet higher than they were,” Coyne says.
“That’s about all we can do at this point, it’s just a wait and see game.”
Meantime, Coyne says there are up to 200 volunteers working at any given time, doing everything from helping transport sand and gravel, to assisting evacuated residents with clearing appliances and debris from their homes, to keeping people fed with hot meals.
But even as the community continues to rally, Coyne says the town has been under immense pressure for two full weeks.
“Volunteers are getting tired. Drivers are getting tired. This isn’t one event for us. I think everybody needs to understand that. We’ve had probably five maybe six individual emergency events during this. It started with a flood and then it went to broken waterlines, a sewer system problem, we lost our gas line, we’ve had major accidents,” he explains.
“It’s just a compounding effect right now. People are tired, you know? We want a day off, and now we’re preparing for the worst again. It’s just starting to weigh on people to be honest.”
