I just learned about the floods, and the photos are definitely not comforting.

Are you safe?

If you can get thisaway, Nightingale, you’re welcome at my house.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2021 03:10PM by kathleen.

You're a great person, Kathleen!

stillanon Wrote:
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> You're a great person, Kathleen!

Yes!

What they said!

Thanks so much kathleen. I'd be delighted. But don't worry - I'm staying put, for now. :)

Maybe sometime though. I'd like to go on the Grand RfM Tour.

I've been thinking about Nightingale too
Not exactly what part of BC she's at but the level of devastation is breathtaking. Biggest natural disaster in BC and maybe Canada's history.

Biggest natural disaster since the last Ice Age, anyway.

Perhaps I have lived in too many flood prone areas, but the level of devastation doesn't look that large. One flooded basement is huge if it happens to be yours, but the extent of the overall flooding looks manageable. Abbotsford and Chilliwack are both in low-lying areas along the Fraser River. Flooding is common there. Merritt is in a spectacular mountain valley, but it is an enormous valley, and I would not have expected flooding there. That seems to be the hardest hit place. It's 120 miles from Vancouver.

From what I can see on news reports, it looks like 1 to 2 thousand evacuees now. There will likely be more coming, but I recall the Grand Forks, ND flood of 1997 when there were roughly 80,000 evacuees, 60,000 from Grand Forks (the entire city was evacuated for 6 weeks until water and power were restored) and another 20K or so from surrounding towns. Five thousand showed up at the Air Force base 14 miles west, the day the dike broke, needing a hot meal and a place to sleep. And you think you've had surprise guests show up!

BTW, the Air Force pulled it off, somewhat I think even to their surprise. I bet that was quite the scramble.

There was a major flood in Winnipeg in 1955 that took out most of that city. I don't know how many were evacuated then, but a hundred thousand would not surprise me, maybe more. For the people there at the time (Neil Young and Randy Bachman were growing up there then), it was a life-altering event. They included home movie clips of that flood in their Prairie Town music video. People in Winnipeg still talk about that flood.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7ewuZS49aE

One of the refrains is "springtime melts the snow, rivers overflow. Portage and Main, 50 below". the song is basically a lament.

Just trying to give some perspective. There have been bigger floods. Much bigger.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
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> There have been bigger floods. Much bigger.

Like Noah's. :)

Well, that one kind of retired the trophy.

I checked cbc, and I have to admit there are some very impressive mudslides, and Abbotsford looks like it may be in significant danger. I had no idea it was now 170,000 residents. I spent a day trapped there 22 years ago (long story) and it wasn’t much of a town then. Now I guess it is part of a continuous east suburb of Vancouver.

Best wishes to the province. This looks like it will be a slog.

Hi BoJ. You're right about Abbotsford. Absolute crisis. And yes, a hard and long slog, for them and oh, so many others.

Today they've sent the Army in to help out with the road situation. (Thanks Quebec!) :)

Some people are trapped between places due to major road washouts and can't get around to go where they were headed. A solution in some areas for people who were travelling around the province would be to go through the US and back up and around the cut-off areas but who walks around with their passport in their pocket when they're travelling domestically? So that idea's a no-go. Unless US Border folks give us a free pass just this once but I can't see that happening.

Disasters like this sure show all the places where you're weak and vulnerable. Our farmers in the Fraser Valley are devastated, coping with flooded land and major loss of their livestock.

It's tough to watch the news these days.

I'd like to hear your stuck-in-Abby story sometime. (It's the largest municipality in BC now, outside Metro Vancouver. Time changes everything, as they say).

One of the other major concerns is that drinking water in some areas is compromised.

I'm sure other major effects will continue to be highlighted as they occur and are discovered.

Lots of people are springing into action to help out in major ways. It's heartwarming to see. Government reps and agencies, of course, are right on it. For us, a major widespread disaster.

Wow, we sure take a lot for granted, until everyday life is rudely interrupted. I'm not personally affected physically and have good confidence that my area of the province is safe (unless something major is on the way that we cannot predict) but you cannot help but commiserate with thousands of severely affected folks around and about.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/19/2021 04:21PM by Nightingale.

Thanks, LR. I'm near Vancouver.

Close enough to Alberta to swing by that way sometime!

Any time Nightingale

:)

Thank you, Tevai, and everybody, for checking in. Yes, early Monday morning B.C. experienced major flooding and rock/mud slides, following heavy rainfall, that blocked major highways, trapping people in their vehicles with one known fatality and several people reported missing so far. Witnesses report many more possible casualties as mountainsides slid down onto roads without warning. People are living in their cars at the moment and food is already reported to be scarce as the supply chain is cut off in both directions (coming and going).

I’m a good few miles away from the closest affected city. I live in southwestern B.C., in the Lower Mainland (includes Vancouver, on the coast). The areas most affected by floods and road/highway washouts are in the Interior portion of B.C. I’m physically safe. A little shaken because my nephew had a close call. He was travelling from the Interior down to Vancouver early that morning (Monday). He was fortunate to be on a portion of the highway between the slides so he’s OK but stuck unless/until he can helicopter out as there are no intact highways between there and here. We are cut off from the rest of the province and they are cut off from us. I can’t help but go over the “what ifs” and it’s a very scary reminder that we’re not 100% in charge of our own destiny. You get up in the morning, head full of plans and wham. If you’re fortunate you get to fulfill those plans and carry on for a good long while enjoying life. Having a family member that close to a natural disaster makes it more personal and you can empathize even more with those suffering heartbreaking losses. You can't linger over the what ifs - what if he had been further up or down the road, etc. if you want to keep your sanity.

Amid the major road transportation interruptions, there are already reports of hoarding or panic buying of groceries and at least one supermarket was completely wiped out in less than a day, left only with empty shelves and freezers – reminiscent of the early days of the pandemic when people worried about obtaining groceries. A huge parking lot on the other side of the broken highway was shown on the news to be full of truckers going nowhere, parked for the duration, without immediate access to any amenities, including no washrooms.

Our public safety minister gave a news conference, struggling to maintain his composure as the extent of the damage and the human cost became apparent. We went from thinking at first that things could be back to normal within days, to weeks, and now they’re saying months. Those mountains are beautiful but when they rumble and tumble it’s a vastly different story. All the heavy debris will have to be removed, highways rebuilt, and everything else that all entails.

My nephew and his friend were sleeping in their car in a small town, in the rain and cold, when someone knocked on their window, invited them into their home, fed them and gave them a bed for the night. So many heartwarming accounts like that have already surfaced. People really do come through in times of emergency. I saw TV coverage of a hockey coach who invited a travelling minor league hockey team and their adults into his small home so they could find shelter and food. Lots of young males in a little space. They seemed to have kept their good humour and one said it’s a great bonding experience. “We already feel closer.” Certainly physically in that tiny space that is true!


Some of the affected towns/cities:

Merritt: Town flooded out – entire population evacuated (140 miles from Vancouver; 3.5 hr drive).

Agassiz: Mudslides closed major highway, people in vehicles trapped by debris and rescued by helicopter (125 miles from Vancouver; 2 hr drive).

Abbotsford: People rescued by boat as areas were flooded in only four hours by heavy rainfall, without warning. (40 miles from Vancouver). The floodwaters came from the Nooksack River (Washington, USA). Evacuation orders for some areas are in effect today (eg: Sumas Prairie) The whole city is presently under a state of emergency.



News stories:

https://globalnews.ca/news/8374573/people-trapped-vehicles-agassiz-highways-flooding/

https://globalnews.ca/news/8377310/bc-flooding-mudslides-rescue-cp-rail/

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/merritt-flood-recovery-1.6250641


Excerpts:

“B.C. public safety and transportation officials say it is still unclear when major highways across the province will re-open amid the heavy rain, flooding, mudslides and rockslides.”

“Search teams using dogs started looking for people whose cars may have been buried in landslides across the Canadian province of British Columbia on Tuesday, as the country’s two biggest railways reported serious damage to their networks.

“The storms, which started on Sunday, wrecked roads in the Pacific province, forced an oil pipeline to close and limited land access to Vancouver, the largest city.

“Canadian Pacific Rail said it was shutting down its Vancouver mainline because of the flooding, while Canadian National Railway said it experienced mudslides and washouts in southern British Columbia.

“Some areas received eight inches (200 mm) of rain on Sunday, the amount that usually falls in a month.

“Rescuers equipped with diggers and dogs will start dismantling large mounds of debris that have choked highways.

“If a bit of machinery contacts a vehicle or the dogs indicate a person, that’s when we stop and … dig by hand until we find what they were indicating, to confirm whether it’s a live victim or if it’s a recovery,” Captain John Gormick of Vancouver’s heavy urban search and rescue team told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

“Police in Abbotsford, some 70 km (40 miles) southeast of Vancouver, on Tuesday, ordered the evacuation of parts of the city.

“Authorities in Merritt, some 200 km (120 miles) northeast of Vancouver, ordered all 8,000 citizens to leave on Monday as river waters rose quickly, but some are trapped in their homes, city spokesman Greg Lowis told the CBC.

“We are not confident about the structural integrity of any of our bridges,” he said.

“The landslides and floods come less than six months after wildfires gutted an entire town, as temperatures in the province soared during a record-breaking heat dome.

“Helicopters carried out multiple missions on Monday to rescue hundreds of people trapped in their vehicles when mudslides cut off a highway near the mountain town of Agassiz, about 120km (75 miles) east of Vancouver.

“Canadian Forces Cormorant helicopters started rescue flights to the slide area and Farnworth [public safety minister] said they hope to rescue the remaining people in the next few hours.”

“Residents of Merritt, B.C., still reeling from a raging wildfire season that put the entire city on evacuation alert this summer, are now waiting for fall floodwaters to recede so they can survey the damage the latest disaster has delivered.

“All residents were ordered to evacuate the city, located about 200 kilometres northeast of Vancouver, shortly after 10 a.m. PT on Monday after flooding from the Coldwater River caused the complete failure of the municipality's wastewater treatment plant.

“That led to what city officials called an "immediate danger to public health and safety." As of Tuesday, all three bridges across the river were unpassable — one collapsed, the other two require inspection.”

“Thousands of farm animals are reported to have perished in the flood and thousands more are in "critical need of food", according to the province's minister of agriculture.”

-----

And the news still rolls in, updating the situation in all these places so familiar to me. We used to drive from Vancouver up through the Interior for summer holidays every year as kids. We had a cabin in Hope (funny coincidence that it’s town where my nephew is presently awaiting evac in some form). I have innumerable fond memories of all those places we travelled through, admiring the scenery and enjoying the farm produce and all the amazing fruit every year.

You never know what’s going to happen when you get up in the morning. After this season of fire and flood I’m at the point where I have a go-bag near the front door that I never unpack. I know that’s an overreaction but wow, it’s been a year or two, hasn’t it. No harm in being prepared for more. As they say, life isn’t for the faint of heart.

One of the enormous pluses in times of emergency is to see all the selflessness, resourcefulness and caring of all the good people that are around. Definitely the first-responders, so courageous, prompt and skilled, the officials keeping their heads and springing into action, as well as members of the affected communities who reach out to assist whoever they can, and all those further away who donate and commiserate and otherwise say “you’re not alone”.

I’m OK. Just a bit teary. Tired too. Looking to see what little I may be able to do to assist.

Thanks so much, everybody, for thinking of us.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2021 07:55PM by Nightingale.

I thought you maybe had no electricity to see Tevai's post. I'm glad you are OK. Thanks for letting us know what is going on there.

I hate to think of any destruction to that beautiful area of the world.

I can handle a lot. But no electricity. Eek. Fortunately, I'm close enough to the big city that that doesn't happen all that often. Although out of the blue there was a power outage a couple of weeks ago. The worst outcome for me was no TV, right when my favourite show was on.

No computer is no fun either. No RfM. Yow.

What a disaster this is. Hard to imagine that all road access to the coast is closed down! The repercussions of this event will be long lasting, most of all for the people who live in the area, but also for all of us who rely on the supply chain that connects our country, particularly BC and Alberta.

Yay for NG!

Good to hear from you, Nightingale! I hope that the rescuers are able to get your nephew and his friend out in a timely manner. But it sounds like he is safe for now.

Wow Nightingale! Glad you are doing fine under these circumstances. I guess I have been too caught up in the US political theater to learn how the weather has so affected your area. I have been to Vancouver twice and it is one the most beautiful areas of North America. I still remember meeting you there with my work colleague as we had a project in Vancouver. Keep us informed. It is a relief to know you are hanging in there.

Hi Eric. Yes, that was fun meeting you. I'm so glad to know you.

I'm largely unaffected other than emotionally. It's hard to see areas you love being devastated by floods and slides and the human toll is tough to watch. It's definitely not all that far away from me (a town in absolute crisis is only 30 miles or so from me) but also hard to imagine anything like that could happen here near the big city. However, maybe that's what all these suffering people felt too and then bam. You kind of toddle along feeling like you're in charge of your space and then you find out not quite. It was sure agonizing to worry about my nephew's safety and my sister's all-night ordeal when she knew he was caught in it a ways up the Fraser Canyon, where devastating rock and mud slides occurred.

It's definitely been a year: unprecedented summer heat, autumn deluges and now this. Not to mention the lurking virus. I live in one of the areas with ongoing high infection numbers so still can't resume life as normal. Still, it's been much worse on that score.

Right now I'm worried about supply chain issues. Govt is begging people not to panic or hoard but I want to fill up my gas tank today and get in a few staples. Hopefully this doesn't presage yet another tough winter. As long as I have toast and tea in quantity I think/hope I can weather most storms, both literal and figurative ones.

Hope you and yours are all well, Eric. Nice to see you around.

Hi, looking in. Yes, we're connected, by many things but roads are a major one. Some people are already saying oops re the supply chain issues - whose idea was it to only have one major transportation route for so much commerce, etc. We already had issues in that regard due to COVID but now the mountains have rumbled and we're in a bit of a state. It will affect a lot of people and everyday life for a long time to come. I don't know what Beautiful B.C. is going to look like after this.

Thanks LW!

Yes, summer, all is well with nephew except now he's stuck down here in the city and won't be going back up home for the duration. Still, that's minor compared to what might have been.

I know you can't worry overmuch about might-have-beens but this was a big one. I'm crying just to think of my sister's appalling grief if she had lost her son. It sure gives you an even deeper and more painful perspective on how tragedy affects others who were just going about their business as usual and in an instant life irrevocably changes. Insignificant choices can become life and death. Depending on what time you leave your house and travel on a certain route may be the difference between living or not. Life is kind of a crap shoot in so many ways, eh?

Nightingale, glad to learn that things largely might come out okay, glad to hear you're safe and sound.

I guess you all had it coming, with the steepness already built into the pass only a european style tunneled road can survive these similar conditions.

It is nice to hear of the human touch of helping one another out when tragedy came to town.

Mormon Tragedy, there in a theme in that where we are helping one another out.
Literally.

Trying to make the point that people have a tendency to badly assess risk, both over emphasis, or underemphasis on the level of risk, I became my own case study earlier in the thread. I seriously misunderestimated the devastation. (My all time favorite George W Bush malapropism - it should be a word). Oy vey.

Floods in Utah tend to be flash floods, terribly dangerous because they appear out of seemingly nowhere, full of mud and shattered wood. They also recede very quickly. Wider, flatter, always flowing rivers flood more slowly, and take a really frustrating amount of time to recede. The Fraser River at Abbotsford is still quite high and looks to stay that way into next week. They have managed to build dikes high enough and fast enough to keep critical infrastructure functioning. So far so good, knock on wood.

News reports say 17K people are still evacuated. Merritt had a complete failure of their wastewater treatment plant, so their water source is contaminated with raw sewage, and the city water is deemed not safe to drink, even if boiled, which is why that town (7K people) was evacuated.

Landslides are getting plowed off the road, but I don't know what they will do about those major bridge washouts. I guess they will have to put in temporary culverts and dirt roads around the washout and rebuild the bridges, but going into winter has to be the worst possible time to have to do major road construction. A lot of civil engineers and construction workers are going to earn their keep this winter.

I keep tabs on what is going on in interior BC because I first visited there for Expo 87 I think it was, when Charles and Di visited. The highway from Calgary to Vancouver was the most beautiful highway I had ever seen, an opinion I still hold. If you have never been, I highly recommend it. I prefer the northern route through Banff and Revelstoke, but the southern route, Crowsnest Pass, is not chopped liver either. I do my best to generate reasons to make that drive whenever I can. Covid has put a real crimp in my plans.

Anyway, sounds like the acute crisis is slowly receding, but the cleanup is going to be something to behold. I know in Grand Forks, ND, they threw themselves a big "We Have Recovered" party at the 20th anniversary of the flood. At the tenth anniversary, recovery was still very much a work in progress.

Yeah, awful about the water treatment plant. All around an emergency situation for thousands in so many ways.

In Abbotsford they had announced they'd have to destroy over 20 homes to build an emergency levee to save the Sumas Prairie area. Now Canadian Forces are coming in to build a dyke instead and to monitor the breaches in the existing levee. Whew, for those homeowners facing losing their homes for the greater good. Of course, many will suffer extreme flood damage, so it's good news/bad news for them.

I've driven to Alberta a few times. Yes, Banff is gorgeous as well as many other areas and the drive itself.

Eek re a 10-20 yr recovery time. I can believe it will be a while as things are looking pretty bad with major highways and bridges completely destroyed and impassable.

Now they're reporting four people missing. From a TV news cameraman who was on scene as it happened, he was certain there would be many more casualties, going by what he'd seen - many vehicles were behind him as his truck was nearly hit by falling logs and the land behind him disappeared under tons of mud and rocks.

I've always appreciated living in British Columbia but even so I'm surprised that I'm feeling so emotional at all the destruction of familiar locations. Too, of course, I feel terrible for those most closely impacted, with loss of life and property. I think we're so very fortunate that it seems the casualty number will be relatively low, amazing for such a sudden complete catastrophe in such a widespread area of our province.

I guess it's not a good time for you to take a driving holiday to B.C., BoJ. Maybe next year...

Now we're into gas rationing in southwestern B.C. Only 30 litres at a time per (non-emergency) vehicle. It's operating on the honour system at the moment - how can they enforce it, unless service stations want to somehow hobble their pumps - not practical, and they can't put an enforcement officer at each station - that would be over the top.

Looks like we'll be getting our supply from Alberta for a while and even the good ol' US of A. Thanks, all!

Too, more heavy rain is on the way. Pretty bad news for the most direly affected areas still trying to get rid of all that excess water.

What this emergency immediately demonstrates is how fragile is our control over even the basics of our day to-day life. The early days of the pandemic also highlighted this disturbing fact and to a degree those issues are ongoing. Who thinks much about the supply chain or the highway system or the ground on which we choose to build our home or the realities of geography, weather and time as we wander blithely along. To start running out of basic food, dairy and produce within days of an incident that is not in our immediate back yard is disturbing. I don't recall gas rationing before at all (but my memory isn't perfect).

Previously, the ups and downs of life didn't seem as challenging as in the past two years - the pandemic changed everything and continues to be in our faces all this time later. And now here in B.C. the weather and geography have pushed themselves to the front of everybody's consciousness and present major ongoing challenges, no matter where we live in the entire province. People living in small towns around and about depend heavily on the highway system. One of my brothers lives in the back of beyond - I don't know how they'll get around to get in their necessaries due to the road situation.

I resisted the impulse earlier in the week to run out and gas up. Now I'll have to deal with long lines of folks waiting to get their 30 L. But really, it's a totally minor issue for me compared to what all is going on for others. But it's startling to be jolted out of our everyday complacency. Just when we were already apprehensive about another COVID winter. It's getting really really old. And we got our first case the other day of the variant of the delta variant which is reportedly much more transmissible.

Who said life is just one thing after another? Sure seems that way with all this upheaval. I thought we might be in for a nice wintry rest in a quieter time of year. Except for all the Christmas hubbub that's already clamouring for our time, attention and money. But usually that's at least somewhat enjoyable and controllable. Times like this, it reinforces that we are not actually in total control. That often comes as a shock because it's easy to forget that.

So here I am feeling impatient about the gas situation and more rain arriving and I just hear on the news that they've recovered three more bodies, for a total of four so far, with at least one other person still reported missing, due to gigantic mud slides on the highway. You could say it's amazing that the casualty count isn't much higher but for those affected families it's absolutely tragic.

I'll shut up now, because...


PS: Except to say - the cause of this disaster is an atmospheric river, due to climate change, experts are saying. It's going to occur repeatedly. I think we're hitting midnight, or something like that. How many decades have humans known about our warming planet? Yet, we persist in our calamitous ways.

Says I, on my way to the petrol pump. :(



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2021 01:45PM by Nightingale.

Couldn't get gas. Huge long line-ups at every station I travelled past. I always try to have a half-tank or at least never below a quarter but I didn't listen to myself earlier in the week, gave in to my terminal laziness and didn't fill up before rationing set in. I didn't want to wait forever at dusk in a gas line-up so just drove on by. Hope it improves during the coming week. I heard of people making lengthy round trips to the USA to fill up (one guy said 16 hrs to drive down south just for gas!) I don't like crossing the border at the best of times - I often have a less than positive experience (I somehow always look nervous and they single me out) so I wouldn't go down just for gas. I also heard that some agents aren't asking for passports, just driver's licenses. That astounds me. Very nice of them but wow.

In the grocery shop yesterday, yikes - no butter, meat freezers nearly empty, limit of 2 cartons of milk per household.

This is just days after the floods and slides - hope it gets resolved quickly but as we get a lot of meat and dairy from the nearby Fraser Valley, which is currently grappling with extreme flood conditions in parts, maybe we're in for a longer haul.

Another atmospheric river is expected today - that's what caused this emergency last week, which is already having long-lasting major impacts. Don't know how the affected areas will be able to withstand more rainfall - it's predicted for this entire coming week.

The city and town officials and workers as well as all the emergency personnel are amazing, rescuing folks, fast-tracking fixes to breached dikes, assessing damage, keeping ousted homeowners informed, arranging for emergency shelters and generally being supportive as they try and keep everybody up to date with the latest events and predictions and plans moving forward.

You just never know when you wake up in the morning what is going to be coming at you. Images of all the damage to people's homes, our farmland, major highways, beloved locations, etc, are heartbreaking. Scary too, to think of people driving along major roadways that suddenly collapse and become rubble right underneath them. Officials are saying we can't just rebuild in the same old way but rather with modernization and with climate change at front of mind because our weather is changing, and fast.

We've been talking about climate change/warming ever since I can remember. I thought we would do better than this by now. Some things you have to learn the hard way.

Two of the bodies found this week were a young couple on a "weekend getaway", having left their 2-yr-old with family. Tragic all 'round.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/21/2021 01:03PM by Nightingale.

Breathe Nightingale breathe, nice big deep breaths..

If another weather front finally finishes rolling through again this week, it's not possible to remove any structures that are already gone, right?

And be grateful, we're all on the back of the pandemic now, thank goodness it wasn't last year.

The push for bigger and better RR grades and new "covered" roads in vulnerable areas is nothing new.

Nightingale, being out of control is defined by not paying attention to purely what remains within your control. Boring probably, but also very stress reducing, too!

Stay happy girl, get gratefulness..

Nightingale, looks like rain for Vancouver all the rest of the week. Plz take care.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/22/2021 08:00PM by kathleen.

Thankyousomuch, kathleen. I think I'm fairly OK in Vancouver. But there's trouble up the road nearby, with some areas below the flood plain and more water on the way.

It's definitely been a year - heat, fires, floods and now more rain. The latter we're used to at this time of year.

Realizing how vulnerable we are due to old roads, too few highways going north and east, communities built on low-lying land and other issues is a big fat wake-up call.

Yesterday, numerous volunteer pilots of small planes packed their holds tight with food and supplies to fly up past all the destroyed roads into communities where people can't get out. That part of all this is extremely heartwarming - people pulling together and caring for strangers.

I'm very fortunate, with shops within walking distance (if they have any food left after some folks got a bit intense and hoardy) and I work from home so don't have to worry too much, yet, about not finding a place to gas up over the weekend.

As long as the power stays on (often, with one strong gust of wind it dies off) I'll be OK. I think. I hope. It would be astounding if we suffered a flood anywhere too close to my place. The situation does tend to curtail one's activities though, for a number of reasons.

However, my nephew is OK - I don't know yet about one of my brothers - I mean, he's OK but not sure about his place up-country - I'm hopeless about the geography - so far I'm not hungry or cold and so I just cannot complain. I hope I remember that. Always see the bright side. Even if there doesn't appear to be one. One of my abiding philosophies of life is that things can always be worse. That thought often cheers me up if I get too whiny sometimes.

Don't be a hoarder but do stock up a bit. Don't forget the toilet paper! Grab a couple of extra books and a bottle :)

Yeah, I won't hoard. My conscience would kill me.

Check re TP. Always have a pack of books awaiting my attention. I get withdrawal if I have fewer than five waiting to go. Just finished A Town Like Alice for the 4th time. Love that story. I would like to be like Ms. Jean Paget but am not that adventurous. And I likely couldn't live in the back of beyond, not even for Joe Harman. I know it's a bit dated now with the language and attitudes expressed, which some people object to, but I believe that the author Nevil Shute was reflecting the attitudes of his time (book was written in 1950 or so), not expressing his own. I don't remember that from my previous readings but did definitely notice it this time, most intensely near the end. (For instance, some of the business premises in Australia were segregated but that was their reality, not reflective of his opinion, I'm thinking). Too, atrocities of war were described, attributed to a named country so likely that could be offensive to some. There's a lot out there to get you into a thorny thicket these days. Hopefully, we're more aware and awake now but definitely not at 100% enlightenment yet.

Didn't think of the bottle - good idea - thanks!

I've read many of Nevil Shute's books and A Town Like Alice is by far my favourite. I've read it several times. There's no escaping the fact that by modern standards most of his books contain politically incorrect, and offensive attitudes. The voice of indigenous people was not included or even considered. I've struggled with that.
But as you said, they were written in a different and less enlightened era, and very likely wouldn't be published these days without much revision (hopefully).
His books depict a long past time and place. It would be nice to think that our beliefs have changed for the better. Perhaps to some extent they have, as I find myself heartened by conversations with my adult children and their friends. However, reading the news from around the world, or just the comment section on a news story about indigenous land claims, for example, it's evident that the attitudes and beliefs depicted in his books have not really gone away. Scratch the surface, and the ugly is still there.
It's been a long time since I've read "Alice" and given all that, I don't know if I will again.

I said above:

"It would be astounding if we suffered a flood anywhere too close to my place."

What a dope. Tempting fate is never a good idea. An area only 3 blocks from my place was flooded last week and had to close the shopping mall there.

On the bright side for me, I didn't hear about it until today. I have been counting street numbers though to figure out how much closer I am to the worrisome areas since my recent move. I'm 7 blocks south of where I was and quite a few blocks further east. South isn't good - we're at a lower elevation here than we were in the old place. East isn't good because it's closer to the most affected areas.

I should never state absolutes, as I did above, because Mother Nature is glorious but also powerful and indiscriminate and not always good-natured.

Still, I'm better off than so many others in the rest of this province, which is currently under emergency alert. I managed to get half a tank of gas today and some dairy. I plan to wait out the coming deluge (three days of heavy rainfall in the forecast) at home, not trying to drive or shop or go out and about at all. Good thing I've always got a few good books on the shelf awaiting my attention at any given time. Now I just have to hope that the power stays on. I forgot to buy a flashlight today. And I would miss my Internet connection. For sure after all this I'm going to work harder on being better prepared for whatever crisis may be just around the corner. It's kind of an unsettled way to live but just the thought of having to evac without notice, as so many BC'ers just experienced, is enough incentive to make like a Girl Guide ("Be Prepared").

I'm fine. Thinking of all those still out of their homes and those who can't go back at all because they're literally flooded out for good. Too, the news from the nearby farms is tragic, with many farm animals lost (cows, chickens etc), including at least 500 cows at last count. Emergency services are flying in tons of animal feed though where needed and wow, what a lot of work and planning is going on. They also need to fly in food for Indigenous communities that are completely cut off by road. I feel for the people who have lost everything without notice. I can't even imagine how awful that would be. I'd be a wreck. I know lives matter, not things, but some things you get attached to.

It's been a year all right, and the year before this one wasn't peaceful either - good news and a nice long rest wouldn't go amiss.

I'm kind of laughing - I finally got gas and now I'm just hunkering down, going nowhere, so why all the panic about gas. Ha.

Some Canadians who crossed the border to gather supplies, which we were told was allowed, without passports or PCR tests, turned out to be not that easy. Somebody forgot to tell the Canadian border guards who were busy yesterday handing out $5700.00 fines to returning citizens who didn't have their PCR done. Now those folks have to contest the fines because the BC government told them it was OK so now they don't want to pay up. (I don't blame them). I'd rather make do without dairy and gas than go through all that hassle.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/23/2021 07:35PM by Nightingale.

I did a double-take when you said that the border authorities were allowing Canadians into the US without passports. One time after 9/11, I had forgotten my passport, which had not been required prior to 9/11. I asked the Canadian official if they would let me in. He half jokingly (but only half) said they had no problem letting me in to Canada, they just wanted to be positive that the US would let me back in without a passport. Canada did not want to be stuck with me.

As it turned out, the customs and immigration agent on my return to the US didn't bat an eye about my only having a drivers license. I'm sure I had a lengthy record in their computer system with all the border crossings I had done.

That said, agents at the border are not known for their flexibility or sympathy, and Canada has famously draconian fines for covid infractions. I think it is probably a sure thing that the fines will be suspended in these cases, but still, it is just one more pain in the butt to deal with.

Hang in there. You'll have some good stories to tell when the dust (mud?) settles. Also when the mud settles, I'll tell you about my day trapped in Abbotsford. It involved border agents.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

>
> As it turned out, the customs and immigration
> agent on my return to the US didn't bat an eye
> about my only having a drivers license. I'm sure I
> had a lengthy record in their computer system with
> all the border crossings I had done.
>
If you have an enhanced driver's license that is as good as a passport between USA and Canada and/or Mexico.


https://www.dhs.gov/enhanced-drivers-licenses-what-are-they

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I did a double-take when you said that the border
> authorities were allowing Canadians into the US
> without passports.

I know - amazing. People were so grateful.


> agents at the border are not known for
> their flexibility or sympathy, and Canada has
> famously draconian fines for covid infractions.

Correct. As I said, unfortunately for many, some of the Canadian authorities on the way back into Canada didn't receive the memo - literally - about relaxation of rules around COVID testing and so people were fined big bucks for not having a PCR test coming back home. One elderly guy ruefully said his quick little trip to stock up on milk and gas was a lot more expensive than he'd expected - with his $5800.00 love note (fine) from the Cdn authorities in his pocket.


> I think it is probably a sure thing that the fines
> will be suspended in these cases, but still, it is
> just one more pain in the butt to deal with.

Yes on both counts. I am not yet so desperate for a few basics, or even gas, to make the trip. Besides, I wouldn't go down without a passport, whatever anybody says.


> Hang in there. You'll have some good stories to
> tell when the dust (mud?) settles. Also when the
> mud settles, I'll tell you about my day trapped in
> Abbotsford. It involved border agents.

Tell me now. I need a distraction. There's a huge update at the moment about all the rain, rain, rain this weekend, and that to come, and so much flooding and more evacuations. Things are closing in on me. The Lower Mainland, where I'm at, is named this weekend as being in a potential flood zone now. Very wet, at the least.

The scariest part of all the scary parts is that in many areas there was little to no warning of major flooding. I wanted to grocery shop today and have lunch with my sister but brother advised me not to go out, anywhere. It's dark and has been raining for hours. There are reports of many MVAs.

I was sad for all my BC compatriots suffering through their flood experiences. Now I'm feeling nervous about it for myself. I'm kind of between two areas that are either experiencing flooding or are expecting it and being evac'd. The biggest concern for me at the moment is a storage locker I have, containing some items I really seriously cannot lose. Nephew just told me that it's pretty close to being in a flood situation. Now I won't be able to relax until the rain stops or I can get over there to see what's up. We're in the middle of a huge dump from a second atmospheric river and another one is expected on Tuesday and through next week. However, I'm still 100% better off than those who have lost homes and businesses and animals and, of course, loved ones.

I would be surprised to learn I was in physical danger or would lose my home so I can't spend much time feeling sorry for myself. It could definitely be a lot worse for me, and it definitely is for so many others.

It's like the entire province just met Armageddon. First the major fires in the summer, now the disastrous floods. I feel so sorry and sad for the communities most adversely affected by both extremes in a matter of a few months. People are being very stoic - I mean you have to keep it together and plough on, no matter what. But wow, it's not our usual experience, especially down here in the big city.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/28/2021 03:14PM by Nightingale.

I was thinking your weather forecast sounded really grim, considering the land is already totally waterlogged, and is not going to soak up any of this rain.

Ok, my Abbotsford experience. I was working for a software company and got a layoff notice in late July, 2001. I was working on a project they wanted me to finish, so I was given 60 days notice and paid a bonus to hang around for those 60 days. Other people were laid off effective immediately.

That was nice, extra money and a running start at looking for another job. Software jobs were hard to come by right then because the dot com meltdown had happened starting in February that year. I planned my usual trip to Canada for Cdn Thanksgiving, and lined up a job interview in Seattle and Winnipeg, so I could even write the trip off as a job hunting experience.

The best laid plans of mice and men, and all that. Two weeks before I was to be laid off, something happened that drastically altered the job market. September 11.

I still went to Winnipeg. Crossing the border into Canada wasn’t too onerous. I visited a few friends in Calgary, and drove on to Vancouver, BC, to get to Seattle.

It had been just under a month since 9/11, and US border security and procedures could charitably be described as chaotic. Radio reports on CBC said the wait at the main Vancouver border crossing (White Rock, BC) was eight hours or worse. Uh-oh. I looked on the map for an alternative, and there was Abbotsford, right on the border, and 30 or so miles east of Vancouver. Brilliant solution.

The line was long, but not absurdly so, maybe one hundred yards. I could see the border crossing. It moved at a glacial pace.

I don’t remember how many hours it was, though I am pretty confident it was more than four. I was distracted. The car in line in front of me ran out of gas. There was no gas station handy, and there were only eight cars between the disabled car and the border. We were all sort of gridlocked friends standing around by that point, so we decided to push the car to the border. There was a gas station in sight on the other side, but of course couldn’t just walk over there and buy a container of gas, even in normal times, and this day was definitely not normal.

It seemed to take forever for the cars in front of us to clear the border. I’m sure the US security people were already on high alert, and they did not look at all happy to see several people pushing a car to the border check point.

The pushers were not questioned, but the driver got quite the grilling. The pushers were most definitely not allowed to push the car across the border. Fortunately, it was flat land, and the driver, and one other person already on the other side were able to get the car past the checkpoint.

The customs and immigration agent, already having a WTF day, having to allow a car to be pushed across the border without violating whatever rules govern pushing cars cross the border, sees me, a single middle aged guy with a beard at the time, with Utah plates on the car, and who had driven from Utah to Winnipeg for Thanksgiving, and was going to Seattle for a job interview.

He looked dubious. Wanted to know how I knew people in Winnipeg. Wanted to know who I knew in Seattle. He finally decided the story was too bizarre to be made up, and let me through. I don’t think they even searched my car, though I was again distracted. I beelined it for the gas station in Sumas, because I really needed to pee.

And that was my day in Abbotsford.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/29/2021 02:53AM by Brother Of Jerry.

I wonder if he thought you were a polygamist? It was good of everyone to help push the car :)

This is a wonderful story, BoJ.

Thank you so much for posting it!

:)

So far only 5 states have issued EDLs: Minnesota, Michigan, New York, Vermont and Washington. The Utah RealID license is not an EDL, though RealID will be required to board any commercial air flight in the US, foreign or domestic destination.

Except for those 5 states, a US resident will need a passport to drive to Canada. All US residents will need a passport to fly to Canada.

In the good old days, any US driver license would get you across the border.