The Herald spoke with Greg Lowis, Director of Corporate Services, on Nov. 16 regarding the flooding situation within the City of Merritt.

“The water is receding this morning in the rivers themselves, the levels are dropping quite dramatically, they’re coming down about as fast as they came up in the first place, which is fantastic,” said Lowis.

“Unfortunately, all that means is that we’re potentially looking at being able to start doing damage assessments.”

Residents of Merritt were evacuated just after 10:00 AM on Nov. 15 due to rising flood waters and the failure of the City’s wastewater treatment plant. Despite water levels dropping, the plant remains compromised.

“We know the wastewater treatment plant, the pumps are running, but there’s absolutely no treatment that can happen,” said Lowis.

“So, anything that goes into the system is just being pulled straight through and discharged immediately into the river. Which means that it’s not as bad as it could be, but it’s still pretty bad. The drinking water situation, the wells were contaminated so we cannot, at this point, provide any safe drinking water anywhere in the City. I know the Public Works have started planning out what it’s going to look like to flush those lines once the water gets down to a lower level, but again, we can’t even begin that process until the water falls further. As a result, we remain on Evacuation Order and we do not have any estimated tine of return.”

Residents of Collettville, which is separated from the rest of Merritt by the Coldwater River, were advised to evacuate their homes around 7:00 AM on Nov. 15 due to rising flood waters which threatened area bridges. Later that night, one of the bridges was destroyed by high flows and the others are no longer considered safe.

“The Middlesboro bridge, which carries Voght St across the Coldwater to Collettville, collapsed last night,” said Lowis.

“So, we don’t trust the structural integrity of either of the remaining two bridges, the Main St. bridge or the Houston St. bridge, until they have been inspected by structural bridge engineers, and again, that cannot happen until the water level recedes. At this point anyone who didn’t leave Collettville when they were ordered to do so, has to stay in Collettville, because they cannot safely cross the bridge.”

All other residents who have remained in Merritt are being advised to leave immediately.

“Anyone who can safely leave Merritt should do so,” said Lowis.

“At this point, I know the Kamloops Emergency Support centres have reached their capacity so we’re asking everyone to travel east across the Connector to Kelowna if they can do so safely.”

Work will continue within the City of Merritt to restore water systems and to perform the necessary work to return people to their homes.

“Everyone is working together as a team, we’re really focused on doing everything we can for Merritt’s residents,” said Lowis.

“It’s obviously very hard work, but there’s a very good sense of purpose that I think is fantastic. The Emergency Operations Centre has been running non-stop since this began, the RCMP detachment has been able to bring in support from outside which means they’re actually running at more than normal capacity and they’re doing regular patrols both to ensure the safety of the municipality and also pulling over anyone they encounter and asking why they didn’t evacuate, what they’re doing still in Merritt. So, everything is working about as well as it can be expected to in this situation.”

Some have called this unprecedented flooding a once in 200-year event.

“This is going to define Merritt for years to come,” concluded Lowis.