‘It was causing flooding in homes and cars’; Town of Cochrane in cleanup mode after flooding

CALGARY (660 NEWS) – The town of Cochrane is now in cleanup mode after water and sediment creeped into people’s homes early Friday morning.

“Our fire crews got a call of overland flooding in the Sunset Ridge community,” Suzanne Gaida, Deputy CAO with Town of Cochrane said.

“They responded and the fire chief was called out about (6:50 a.m.). He phoned myself as the (acting) director of emergency management to let me know. We called our roads crews out. We had severe flooding in the Sunset Ridge area, caused by the rains through the evening and this morning. It was causing flooding in homes and cars, so we got out there to manage the water.”

Gaida said despite it being a frantic morning, there were no reports of any injuries. All roads that were previously blocked have since reopened, but the cleanup is well underway.

“It wasn’t just water. It was actually sediment coming down as well, which was blocking our storm drainage system. At that that, we then got another call around 9:00 a.m. that Glenbow Drive was flooding. It was an overflowing ditch on the CP Rail tracks and it was causing us to close a major road,” Gaida said. “Water was going across the street and into homes and into basements.”

Gaida added that the rain currently falling is appropriately draining through the storm system.

“We are always ready. We live on the river and a number of creeks in our community. In 2013, we had flooding. We’ve had flooding in the past and we have had some overland before. So we are always ready. Did we expect it this quickly? I can’t say that we did but we reacted and acted as best as we could and as best as we could.”

A rainfall warning has ended for Calgary, Airdrie, Olds, Cochrane and the surrounding counties, but was in effect for most of Friday.

Calgary is still under a high stream flow advisory for the Bow and Elbow River. On top of that, snow is still falling in Jasper and Banff National Parks.

660 NEWS Meteorologist Andrew Schultz says Friday’s totals alone could match or surpass what we had in the Spring.

“Technically you should see about 150 millimetres of rain through the spring months,” said Schultz. “Not the case. In March, it was listed as trace when it comes to showers so a dry start.”

Schultz said that Calgary was about 40 millimetres off the average for rainfall in the spring. He anticipates that rainfall for the summer will be about average for the city.

While Calgary is experiencing wet weather, it’s a different story in the mountains as a snowfall warning remains for Banff and Jasper National Parks.