Water Over the Bridge

By Marilyn Boake

32.5 centimetres. That’s about half of the total rainfall many Albertan towns see in a year, but, in 2013, the small town of High River recorded it in just two days. The heavens had opened above Alberta in one of the most infamous floods to ever hit Canada, and in High River and across the region, many lives would be changed forev

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marilyn Boake
• Release date: Dec 12, 2018
• ISBN: 9781999522216

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Prologue

October 1, 2013

Ordering her wine, Alison advises our server, Make it a nine-ounce glass. It’s been a rough day.

It is Day 103 post-flood, almost a third of a year later, and our group has gathered in a local lounge under the guise of enjoying a few laughs and catching up—but in reality, everyone needs to vent. The strain of the last three months is apparent in each of my friends’ faces.

Deanna tells us that she is feeling more stress now than during the days directly after the flood. Her home still needs many repairs, and they are living in construction chaos. Installed this week, her fridge provided a huge relief for a family of five. They have been using a mini-bar fridge for the last seven weeks. Their family has lost a third of their living space, mainly the recreation space so desperately needed for an active family with three young children. They have finally installed their front door, and she’s thankful to have a furnace. The basement is very cold, still exposed to the studs, with no insulation installed.

Alison reminds us to focus on the positive. I catch a glimpse of the sadness on her face as she reflects on the loss of her grandfather’s antiques and the photo collection belonging to her in-laws. She is ecstatic to have an installation date set for her furnace, October 10, Day 113, and feels lucky to have two gas fireplaces and two new heaters. They’ve been able to keep the house at 14 degrees Celsius overnight. In Southern Alberta, we can expect subzero temperatures and snow any day. Alison’s family has lost 50 per cent of their living space, with the two girls now sharing what was formerly an office on the main floor of their bungalow.

The conversation turns to Christmas. To my friends, the holidays are a time of celebration and honouring traditions. Since people generally tend to make powerful connections between keepsakes and past holiday memories, my friends are nervous about how their holiday season will unfold; floodwater destroyed decorations stored in their basements. Alison’s eyes swell with tears. This will be a tough time for her, as she used to spend countless hours decorating her house for the holidays. She’s aware of a Project Christmas volunteer group that collects ornaments for families who lost theirs, but Alison cannot yet deal with replacing her Christmas keepsakes—it is far too personal. Rebuilding their Christmas collections will take time.

Alison quickly changed the subject from Christmas, instead turning our attention to her insurance woes. She is frustrated with the multiple adjustors she’s had to deal with.

Just over a week ago, an adjustor from Mobile, Alabama, told her, Ma’am, I have your file and I’m the only person you’ll need to talk to. Those were his exact words. Today, another Mobile, Alabama, adjustor responded to her request for an update: Ma’am, I’ve only just received your file about 15 minutes ago.

Recounting her insurance situation puts a few more cracks in her positive demeanour. Why are we at Day 103 and still there are no answers? Winter is almost here.

I turn the conversation to the progress in town. Our swimming pool complex is opening soon. Our children, all competitive swimmers, have had an opportunity for some deep bonding time while carpooling three days a week to the Claresholm indoor pool, a 45-minute drive south of High River. Earlier today, we heard that our pool would open on October 7. Eight hours later, the swim coach advised us of an opening-day delay, now scheduled for October 15. We wonder aloud how we can keep our swimmers motivated. Although they love to swim, they aren’t thrilled about spending two hours of their precious after-school time in the car. Each week that passes becomes more difficult.

Groceries have been available in town since early July, but we still can’t buy a postage stamp or mail a parcel here. At least we have a few more options for dining out.

We have a long discussion about how we, as Canadians, are the first to donate to disasters around the world, yet we cannot willingly accept help ourselves. Alison urges the group to visit the Salvation Army for food and household item donations. An uncomfortable silence ensues. She reminds everyone that outsiders donated these goods and money to help all High River residents get back on their feet. Again, silence. My friends prefer to buy their own replacement items, noting that there are others in much worse need who could better use the offered goods and services. It isn’t clear why accepting help is so difficult. Perhaps they perceive a stigma associated with it?

Anne feels that her family is now in a better position than many others are. She has good insurance coverage, and reconstruction on her home is moving along. Anne has a furnace and a fridge and has been living in her home for several weeks now. Last evening, her youngest son asked for his plastic animal collection; she had to remind him that it’s gone. Anne spends her days compiling lists of items and their estimated replacement values for her insurance company and seems to be a little further along in the process than the rest of the group. Anne, a self-acknowledged Mrs. Christmas, also feels it’s too early to replace her Christmas stash. She believes that travelling to Ontario for Christmas, where they would be welcomed by relatives, is the best choice for her family.

Confessing that she’s being a bit of a Debbie Downer, she nevertheless wonders aloud if our High River homes will even be insurable next year. Insurance has risen by at least 200 per cent over the last few years for everyone sitting around the table. Two years ago, High River experienced a windstorm that destroyed many of our roofs, and we were already dealing with thousand-dollar deductibles as a result. It’s hard not to wonder if our rates will climb still higher.

Throughout the evening, I remain uncharacteristically quiet. I’m here to listen and to support. My flood story is so completely different from that of my friends. My family is now intimately familiar with the concept of survivor guilt. We are one of the few families in High River who experienced no flood damage except for the damaged back door and doorframe, broken by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) during their door-to-door search in the initial days after the flood. Our power hadn’t even gone out. Tonight doesn’t seem like the right time to tell my friends that my custom-ordered door arrived but was damaged so we have to wait for another. Custom ordered not because it was anything special, but rather because the house is 40 years old and the door measurements are slightly off stock door standards. Our makeshift lock on our broken door will have to do for another six weeks.

Part I

Who We Are

1

Life in our idyllic small town of High River, Alberta, forever changed on June 20, 2013. A few days earlier, a massive rainstorm was trapped in the Rocky Mountains to the west, hastening the melt of the mountain snow and troubling the minds of many Southern Albertans living near rivers fed by these headwaters. The combination of the mountain runoff and more than 300 millimetres of rain over a 24-hour period quickly overwhelmed the rivers. The Highwood River, which winds through the middle of High River, overflowed its banks. Levels peaked at over 1,800 cubic metres per second, causing extreme flood conditions and massive destruction. Since the flood, most residents are well versed in river flow metrics and could tell you that a flow of more than 200 cubic metres per second here can be dangerous. The town issued a mandatory evacuation order to all 13,000 High River residents, many of whom would be displaced for two weeks, and others for much longer.

Declared the costliest natural disaster in Canadian history at the time, at an estimated six billion dollars in damages, the 2013 Southern Alberta flood impacted over 100,000 Albertans in 30 communities. For many days after the flood, town officials assessed all 4,500 of High River’s homes, then assigned each home with a colour code. Homes with the worst damage received a red code, where the structural integrity of the building, flooring system, or both was compromised. The more than 500 homes coded red would likely require demolition. Another 2,000 homes were coded orange. These homes would require extensive repairs before residents could return home. Fewer homes were coded yellow, those requiring minor repairs, or coded green, meaning they were undamaged.

The river expanded to more than 30 times its typical width and covered more than 50 per cent of the town in water. The floodwater damaged half of the town’s communication infrastructure and five electrical substations. Three people drowned: two in High River and one in Longview. Another person died in an all-terrain vehicle accident while out helping neighbors who were dealing with flooding. The town’s recovery would be very slow and difficult.

2

Situated 66 kilometres south of Calgary, High River’s first residents, dating as far back as the late 1800s, were ranchers who settled along the river’s edge for obvious reasons. Many people believe that High River is named for the water level of the river. In fact, it is named after the tall cottonwood trees that grow along the banks of the river.

South of Calgary on Highway 2, Alberta’s main north–south multi-lane corridor, the urban spread gives way to prairie fields, a patchwork quilt in shades of greens and yellows, dotted with hay bales, cows, and horses. The pollution haze of the big city fades. The sky opens up, and the snow-encrusted mountaintops stand tall over the prairie landscape, their majestic beauty filling the horizon. The town has retained its bucolic charm, with an eclectic mix of quaint heritage homes in long-established neighbourhoods. As a historic farming community, homes were built close to water sources long before town planning departments existed. Many still live in the homes built by their ancestors. The town, as a whole, is somewhat resistant to change, as I imagine most small heritage towns are. The installation of a traffic circle in 2010 stirred up quite a controversy.

In various surveys done over the years, residents continually cite small-town atmosphere and friendliness as what they like best about living in High River.

There are generations of families with strong community