Controlled cut questioned

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This article was published 19/05/2011 (5234 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

NEWTON — People here are relieved water levels from the breached dike at Hoop and Holler bend haven’t come anywhere near predictions — and they wonder if the breach was necessary at all.

Early Wednesday, Premier Greg Selinger didn’t rule out closing the controlled breach of the Assiniboine River as early as this weekend if conditions continue to improved.

That was before concerns about a weak spot in the Portage Diversion could force provincial officials to increase the flow at Hoop and Holler bend to ease the pressure on the Assiniboine River and the diversion.

“I was willing to make that sacrifice for the good of others” by letting water from the breach flood his land, said Shea Doherty, who helps run the family business, Our Farm Greenhouses. “Now, I wonder, did they have to do that?”

About one-third of the 64 acres operated by the greenhouse have been flooded. But water wasn’t anywhere close to the four-foot-high, 270-metre long earth-and-sandbag dike built over two days to protect the greenhouse on Wednesday afternoon. About 50 to 70 volunteers helped build their dike. The family “basically took all our topsoil off” to build the earthen portion of the dike.

“I wish they had been able to forecast it better,” Doherty said. However, he said, he felt the greater issue is that the province decided the dikes in the lower Assiniboine River, just west of Winnipeg, couldn’t handle 24,000 cubic feet per second of water like they did in the 1976 flood. The province breached the dike at Hoop and Holler bend to keep the lower Assiniboine River flow at about 18,000 cfs.

“That’s the big thing. The province neglected the dikes. Why have they done that?”

Even so, the sentiment for Doherty and others interviewed in the area Wednesday afternoon was happiness that the release of water into the area could stop within days.

“Relieved,” said Randy Verwey, a farmer in the area threatened by flooding from the breach, on the likely closing of the breach. “The sooner the better,” he said. “I don’t know that it was or wasn’t necessary. They took precautions.”

His sister, Pat Williams, who also lives in the affected area, was willing to give the province the benefit of the doubt, too. She said it should prompt the province to improve flood protection to the west side of Winnipeg in the future. “You use it as a learning situation. It might have been a test run,” Williams said.

A senior member of the Norquay Hutterite Colony, near Oakville, was also sympathetic to the province’s flood forecasting. While the Red River has flooded frequently, people have less experience with the Assiniboine River. “This is rare,” he said.

Premier Greg Selinger would not discuss why the flood forecast was so inaccurate. The province forecast a level of 54,000 to 56,000 cubic feet per second, but levels haven’t reached 52,000 cfs. It projected it would have to release water at 3,000 cfs at the breach but so far is only releasing about 400 cfs.

Selinger said weather conditions have become more favourable compared to last week’s cool, wet weather. That’s given the province more confidence in the diking system, allowing dikes to dry and firm up.

“The reality is that (the breach) took enormous pressure off the dikes at a crucial time,” Selinger said. “Everyone agreed (the breach) was absolutely essential.”

For example, Selinger noted that right behind where he held his press conference Wednesday, helicopters delivered sandbags to fortify the temporary earthen dikes built last March along the Assiniboine between Portage la Prairie and Headingley.

As to why dikes on the Assiniboine west of Winnipeg were deemed unable to take the amount of water they held in the 1976 flood, Selinger said that will be examined during a flood post-mortem. “The dikes had not been used in 35 years,” he said.

“You have to take precautions. You have to plan for the worst-case scenario,” he said. “What we did was everything to minimize the damage to people and property.”

 

bill.redekop@freepress.mb.ca