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Samantha Lock (now) Dani Anguiano Gloria Oladipo and Oliver Holmes (earlier)

Canada storm: floods could lead to country-wide shortages as air force deployed to British Columbia – as it happened

A view shows the damaged Coquihalla Highway 5 after mudslides near Coldwater River Provincial Park, British Columbia, Canada.
A view shows the damaged Coquihalla Highway 5 after mudslides near Coldwater River Provincial Park, British Columbia, Canada. Photograph: BC Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure/Reuters

Our live coverage of Canada’s catastrophic floods will now close.

Thanks for joining us and you can catch up with any new developments by following along here.

Updated

Advance team of soldiers is in BC with more on the way

An advance team of Canadian soldiers is on the ground in British Columbia assessing the needs of local authorities as more are on the way.

The Royal Canadian Air Force shared a snap of soldiers departing Edmonton bound for Abbotsford late Thursday.

Updated

Thousands of farm animals dead and more trapped

Thousands of farm animals have died and many more are trapped by floods in desperate need of food and water

Abbotsford, one of Canada’s most intensively and diversely farmed areas, was among places hardest hit. Home to more than 1,200 farms, it supplies half of the dairy, eggs and poultry consumed by British Columbia’s 5.2 million residents.

Aerial footage showed several barns engulfed by flood waters. Farmers and residents have been frantically scrambling to save their animals from rising waters, resorting to motorboats and jetskis to tow partly submerged cows one by one to higher ground.

Our reporter Ashifa Kassam has more on this story here.

Some dramatic new pictures of the devastation caused to British Columbia’s roads are now in.

In this aerial photo, damage caused by heavy rains and mudslides is pictured along the Coquihalla Highway near Hope, British Columbia.
In this aerial photo, damage caused by heavy rains and mudslides is pictured along the Coquihalla Highway near Hope, British Columbia. Photograph: Jonathan Hayward/AP
Flood damage seen in the Sumas Prairie area of Abbotsford, British Columbia south of a closed Hwy 1, on 18 November, 2021.
Flood damage seen in the Sumas Prairie area of Abbotsford, British Columbia south of a closed Hwy 1, on 18 November, 2021. Photograph: Philip Mclachlan/AFP/Getty Images
The Coquihalla Highway 5 is severed at Sowaqua Creek northeast of Hope, British Columbia.
The Coquihalla Highway 5 is severed at Sowaqua Creek northeast of Hope, British Columbia. Photograph: Bc Transportation Ministry/Reuters

Major highways reopen

Some major highways have reopened to limited traffic in British Columbia, but officials said the situation continues to remain critical.

Floods and mudslides have blocked key transportation routes, leaving thousands in the province stranded.

Transportation minister Rob Fleming said Highway 7, which connects Vancouver to the interior of the province, had been reopened to alternating, single-lane traffic. Another major route is expected to be opened by the weekend while other highways could take months to repair.

Federal Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said talks were underway with Canadian and US border officials to reach an agreement that would allow cargo trucks to detour through border crossings to reach their destinations.

Public safety minister, Mike Farnworth, said at an afternoon news conference that the cost of repairing damage to roads, bridges and other infrastructure is “going to be substantial.”

Vehicles drive through the newly re-opened Highway 7 at the site of a landslide near Hope, in British Columbia, Canada, on 18 November, 2021.
Vehicles drive through the newly re-opened Highway 7 at the site of a landslide near Hope, in British Columbia, Canada, on 18 November, 2021. Photograph: Jesse Winter/Reuters

Updated

'We're one big family', BC deputy premier says in emotional address

British Columbia deputy premier Mike Farnsworth made an emotional address during a press conference on Thursday afternoon.

Appearing to fight back tears, he said: “The positive I’m going to take out of this is that it had shown British Colombians coming together supporting each other.

“Canadians are supporting our province that we are one big family and absolutely that to me is something that we all instinctively know it is absolutely just a remarkable feature and facet of our communities, our people, our province and our country.

“This has been a terrible terrible disaster but I know this: As British Columbians, as Canadians, we stick together. I want to come out of this. I’m going to build a stronger better province and a stronger and better country.”

Updated

Flooding leaves 18,000 still stranded

Emergency crews on Thursday are reportedly still trying to reach 18,000 people stranded after floods and mudslides destroyed roads, houses and bridges in British Columbia in what could be the costliest natural disaster in Canadian history.

Receding floodwaters helped rescue efforts, but the downpour blocked off entire towns in the Pacific coast province and cut access to the country’s largest port in Vancouver, Reuters reports.

Many of the affected towns are in mountainous areas to the east and north-east of Vancouver with limited access.

Provincial cabinet ministers told a briefing on Thursday that some major highways are slowly starting to reopen.

Updated

Today so far

That’s all from me today, but my colleague Samantha Lock will have more on Canada’s catastrophic floods shortly.

  • Four people are missing in connection with a deadly mudslide on Highway 99 near Lillooet. Authorities have already recovered one body from the area.
  • The disaster has completely destroyed parts of Coquihalla highway, a major route connecting Vancouver to the British Columbia interior, including a bridge. Officials have said repairs will take months.
  • Joe Biden offered his sympathies to Canadians affected by this week’s floods and landslides during a press appearance with Justin Trudeau and said the pair are committed to addressing the climate crisis. “I know we are both keeping our minds close to the families affected by the storms flooding the British Columbia area in the Pacific north-west.”
  • Officials in British Columbia are urging residents not to panic-buy food and groceries as the region continues to grapple with the impacts of this week’s historic floods.

Updated

Four people are missing in connection with a deadly mudslide on Highway 99 near Lillooet, officials announced Thursday afternoon. Authorities have already recovered one body from the area.

A cameraman who survived the mudslide said the disaster happened quickly and “all the cars that were on the road and all the people, they were just gone”.

“I couldn’t believe it, it was almost like, in the blink of an eye, there were roads, there were cars, there was people, and then bang, everything was gone, just gone. Not a sign of a car, not a wheel, just trees and mud. It was all you could see.”

Flooding and landslides in Canada have completely destroyed some roads and bridges. Parts of Coquihalla Highway, a major route connecting Vancouver to the British Columbia interior, have been hit hard. Footage from Global BC shows a shattered bridge along the highway. Officials have said repairs will take months.

Updated

Officials in Abbotsford say some residents have refused to leave despite the catastrophic floods, putting emergency workers’ lives at risk.

“We are not out of this by a long shot,” said Henry Braun, the Abbotsford mayor, during a news conference on Thursday. The 40 residents who have refused to leave are probably farmers concerned about their animals, Braun said. The floods have killed thousands of animals and left many more trapped and in need of food and water.

Meanwhile, officials rescued 11 residents overnight from the Sumas Prairie area of Abbotsford, the Vancouver Sun reported.

Updated

Cameraman swept up in mudslide: ‘There was just no stopping it’

A news cameraman has shared a harrowing account of being caught in a mudslide on a British Columbia highway. Mike Timbrell, a Global BC cameraman, was on his way back to Vancouver when he heard a “loud, terrifying roar”.

“This roar came and it hit my truck and there were trees flying. I had my seatbelt on. I took it off and laid on the floor of my truck. My truck was moving all over, getting hammered by trees. I thought I was a goner.”

“There was a roar and it slammed. There was just no stopping it.”

When the mudslide came to a stop, Timbrell got out through the passenger door and ran.

“I turned around and looked at my truck and it was half-buried and all the cars that were on the road and all the people, they were just gone.”

Updated

British Columbia officials ask residents not to panic-buy

Officials in British Columbia are urging residents not to panic-buy food and groceries as the region continues to grapple with the impacts of this week’s historic floods.

“Please, do not hoard items. What you need, your neighbours need as well,” John Horgan, the BC premier, said Wednesday. “We are confident we can restore our supply chains in a quick and orderly manner provided we all act as we have been acting over the past two years.”

Produce shelves lie empty at the Save-On-Foods grocery store in Revelstoke, following historic floods in British Columbia.
Produce shelves lie empty at the Save-On-Foods grocery store in Revelstoke, following historic floods in British Columbia. Photograph: Rob Murphy/Reuters

Updated

Biden comments on BC floods and mudslides

Joe Biden offered his sympathies to Canadians affected by this week’s floods and landslides during a press appearance with Justin Trudeau.

“I know we are both keeping our minds close to the families affected by the storms flooding the British Columbia area in the Pacific north-west, but one of the things we spent time on, on our global agenda, is climate change,” Biden said.

“We’ve spent a lot of time dealing with [climate change] and we are on the same page as to the need for us to move on it, and get the rest of the world to move.”

Experts have linked the Pacific north-west flooding to the climate crisis. Scientists expect atmospheric rivers to form in more rapid succession, grow more intense, and become longer, wetter and wider as the climate warms.

Updated

Hello. I’m Dani Anguiano and I’ll be taking over the Guardian’s live coverage of Canada’s devastating floods. The storms have destroyed roads and bridges and prompted the deployment of troops to Canada’s westernmost province to help residents stranded by landslides.

The extreme weather has also left some Christmas tree farms underwater, which will make it more difficult and expensive to purchase a tree this year. Canada is the world’s top exporter of natural Christmas trees with about 2.3m trees exported.

“We can’t ship them because all the roads are closed,” Arthur Loewen, whose tree farm in Chilliwack has been swamped, told Reuters. “We’re basically shut down until the water recedes.”

Joe Biden has commented on the floods and mudslides ravaging the Pacific north-west, saying minds are with the people affected in British Columbia.

More details to follow.

Updated

As residents impacted by flooding in British Columbia and Vancouver Island begin the process of assessing damage and navigating the flood’s aftermath, financial assistance has become available.

Officials from British Columbia announced via Twitter that Disaster Financial Assistance (DFA) is now available for eligible residents “affected by flooding and landslides from Nov. 14-16, 2021.”

A Vancouver resident has spoken with the Guardian and provided insight into the current flooding and how community members are coping.

Rebecca Orr, 53, works for a large VFX company. A resident of British Columbia for over 20 years, Orr said she has “never seen anything like this before” regarding floods in the area.

From a morale perspective, we feel cut off. Everyone I’ve talked to in Vancouver feels like this is something which cuts us off from the rest of Canada not just physically, but emotionally. None of us here can deny climate change is real anymore, because it’s drowning us, but we don’t feel like the rest of Canada understands that. There’s been people saying: ‘try a Toronto winter’, and things like that.


I’m in Vancouver and the main way I’m affected is the supply chain disruption and panic buying. Even though we have the port here in Vancouver, a lot of access by rail to the port in Vancouver inland is actually flooded and the airports too. It’s not so bad in Vancouver but toilet paper has been getting light and it’s hard to get hold of fresh fruit. I’m definitely going to be stocking up on canned goods. If you look at any videos of the interior of Canada, people are going crazy, all the stores are empty.

In my area there has been torrential rains and high winds. I have had a couple of hour-long power outages because of the winds and floods; some peoples’ have been worse. One coworker’s power was out the entire day. Other colleagues have had evacuation notices and I’ve had to cover them. I’ve been fairly lucky working from home, but I think this is just the beginning...

The Coquihalla, the main BC highway that’s been destroyed, has been around since the 80s, and this is the first time this has happened to it. They’re talking about it taking months to fix. A lot of farmers have lost their livelihoods. So we’re feeling worried.

Updated

A happy end to one rescue out of Abbotsford: the Abbotsford police department tweeted that a service dog named Bowser, rescued by firefighters on Tuesday night, has been reunited with its handler.

The dog had been rescued amid intense flooding in the Sumas Prairie area and reunited with the help of law enforcement.

Updated

Abbotsford mayor warns of $1bn in damage from flooding

Abbotsford mayor Henry Braun warned senior level Canadian officials that damage from recent flooding could cost upwards of $1bn, reports the Globe and Mail.

During a news conference today, Braun said he spoke to Canada prime minister Justin Trudeau, British Columbia premier John Horgan and other ministers who assured him that the region had their support following the natural disaster.

“I take them all at their word, but I’ve also prepared them for one big bill at the end of this, because this is not just going to be $10m or $50m; this is in the multiple hundreds, if not higher than that,” said Braun this morning.

Braun also added that current cost estimates didn’t include replacing the city’s dikes, as a cost for that is still to be generated. A previous study done years ago estimated that only replacing the Sumas and Matsqui dikes would cost around $400m.

“They said that the province will be there for us. When you start totaling those things up, you’re going to get up to $1bn, I predict,” said Braun.

Updated

New images posted to social media show the extent of flooding throughout British Columbia, with water levels receding in some areas.

A park in Abbotsford, one of the regions hit hardest by recent flooding, remains submerged.

Similar images show that while water levels are lowering slightly, the park, like many places in Abbotsford, is still badly damaged.

Similarly, many homes were still impacted by the storms, as thousands remain displaced. Shared images show some progress as water levels lower, but surveying the full damage is ongoing.

Railways in British Columbia that link Vancouver to the rest of the province are expected to be unusable due to flood damage, reports the Globe and Mail.

Rail lines owned by Canadian national railway Co. and Canadian pacific Railway Ltd. run along the Fraser River, which spilled its banks and cut off roads, bridge and tracks on Sunday in heavy rain and flooding.

CP’s tracks between Spence’s Bridge and Falls Creek are blocked due to damage in several sections, said Salem Woodrow, a CP spokeswoman. The washouts have severed halted freight on CP’s busiest rail corridor, linking the port and overseas ports with shippers of grain, consumer goods and other products.

“There is no time estimate for when service will resume,” Ms. Woodrow said.

Work currently being done to fix the damaged lines owned by the Canadian national railway was slowed down due to three sink holes opening up beneath the railway.

Highways and roads in Vancouver and throughout BC are similarly flooded and out of service.

Read the full report here.

So far

  • Canadian forces have started arriving in British Columbia to help stranded residents and search areas hit by landslides and heavy flooding.
  • Floods could lead to country-wide shortages and price surges
  • More information from the Guardian’s Chris Watson on the causes behind flooding in British Columbia
  • Abbotsford mayor Henry Braun said the flooding situation is not resolved, saying, “We are not out of this by a long shot.”
  • Flooding in BC could be Canada’s costliest disaster according to local news outlets

It’s morning now in Canada and local news outlets are reporting that the floods could become the country’s costliest disaster.

Some more from Mayor Braun on the weather over the coming days:

Let me address the rain. I am not concerned about today’s rain. What I’m concerned about is next week and what’s coming. There is predicted 80 to 100 milimetres of rain coming next week.

Mayor of Abbotsford: 'We are not out of this by a long shot'

Henry Braun, the mayor of Abbotsford, has just said in a press conference that water levels are continuing to rise in some areas to the east of the city.

“We are not out of this by a long shot,” he said.

He said the damage caused to farms in the area likely cost “hundreds of millions of dollars plus”.

A reminder: Much of the area lies on the former site of Sumas Lake, a vast body of water that was drained in the last century. City officials feared that pumps, which divert water from the basin at a rate of half a million gallons a minute, were on the verge of failing – meaning even more water would inundate parts of the city.

Mayor Braun said the pumps were still operational as of Thursday morning.

It might seem trivial compared to the devastation caused, but Reuters is reporting that the floods could mean the US might suffer a Christmas tree shortage this year.

Canada is the world’s top exporter of natural Christmas trees, exporting about 2.3 million trees per year, with some 97% going to the US.

While British Columbia does not export cut Christmas trees, it is a significant domestic supplier. That means shortfalls in that province will have to be made up with supply from elsewhere, leaving fewer Canadian trees for export, Reuters reports.

“We can’t ship them because all the roads are closed,” said Arthur Loewen, whose tree farm in Chilliwack, east of Vancouver, has been swamped. “We’re basically shut down until the water recedes.”

Trees already cut and wrapped for wholesale buyers are piled up on wood pallets, surrounded by water, he said. His self-serve fields, where people choose and cut their own Christmas trees, are 75% flooded.

Loewen said that if the waters don’t subside within the week, younger trees could be damaged, hurting future supply.

Here is an updated map with the key developments around British Columbia:

Thousands of farm animals have died and many more are trapped by floods in desperate need of food and water after the storm battered a major hub of Canadian agriculture.

Abbotsford, one of Canada’s most intensively and diversely farmed areas, was among places hardest hit. Home to more than 1,200 farms, it supplies half of the dairy, eggs and poultry consumed by British Columbia’s 5.2 million residents.

Aerial footage showed several barns engulfed by flood waters. Farmers and residents have been frantically scrambling to save their animals from rising waters, resorting to motorboats and jetskis to tow partly submerged cows one by one to higher ground.

Many of the farms are in Sumas Prairie, a low-lying fertile stretch of land created by the draining of a lake nearly a century ago. An evacuation order on Tuesday included 121 dairy and poultry farms, according to farmers associations.

Local officials pleaded with about 300 people who defied the order. “If you are still on Sumas Prairie, you need to leave,” said Henry Braun, the mayor of Abbotsford. “I know it’s hard for farmers to leave their livestock, but people’s lives are more important to me right now than livestock or chickens.”

Share your experiences

Whether you live or work in the area, or are helping with search and rescue efforts with the emergency services, we would like to hear from you.

You can get in touch by filling in the form here or contact us via WhatsApp by clicking here or adding +44(0)7766780300. Your responses are secure as the form is encrypted and only the Guardian has access to your contributions.

Why is the flooding so bad?

The area has been drenched by unusually heavy rain – what one meteorologist has referred to as a “parade of storms” – since September. More rain fell in Bellingham in Washington State between Saturday and Monday than normally falls there during all of November.

The heavy rainfall is linked to an atmospheric river, a narrow corridor of concentrated moisture in the atmosphere. Hurricane scientist Jeff Masters has described the phenomenon as like “a river in the sky that acts like a pipe transporting huge amounts of water vapour out of the tropics”.

The flooding has been exacerbated by clearcut logging and its effect on slope stability, the rate at which water is absorbed into the ground and the ability to hold soil in root systems. Without trees, heavy rains can wash large amounts of sediment into nearby water systems, choking creeks and streams and causing them to quickly overflow.

The risk of landslides and debris flow has also been heightened by summer wildfires in the region. “There’s a very clear link between a wildfire happening and the risk of a landslide or debris flow,” Thomas Martin, a forester in the province, said on Tuesday. “If you burn a lot of the trees, grass and shrubs, there are fewer living things to intercept the water. It just flows directly off the hill. And fires can make the soil hydrophobic so the runoff increases even more.”

Further rain is forecast for Thursday, although not on the scale of the massive downpour earlier this week.

Meanwhile, evacuation alerts have been removed in some areas of the city of Abbotsford.

Floods could lead to country-wide shortages and price surges

There are concerns that the catastrophic flooding in British Columbia could see Canadians in other parts of the country face higher prices and shortages in the coming weeks.

The Port of Vancouver is Canada’s largest port but has been cut off due to highway closures.

Retail analyst Bruce Winder told the Canadian Press that the sector will feel the impact of the flood at the peak of the busiest holiday season.

“It’s brutal,” Winder said. “Supply chains for retail have been under siege for some time now due to the pandemic. And this is going to add to the shortage at the worst possible time.”

I was just contacted by a man who lives in the small town of Okanagan Falls, in the interior of British Columbia and a five-hour drive east of Vancouver.

He said he had been “lucky” to avoid the worst of the flood. However, he adds: “The big problem is panic buying has emptied the shelves of the local supermarkets.”

The local government has asked people not to “hoard supplies”.

Fuel stations in British Columbia are also facing shortages and long lines.

Authorities in British Columbia have temporarily reopened a highway out of the district of Hope, where hundreds of people have been stranded.

There is limited capacity and the route is only open to passenger vehicles – allowing those who were stuck there to move on.

“Though there is no confirmed closing time, we encourage anyone wanting to leave to do so now,” the local government said.

Hope is located about 150km east of Vancouver.

On Wednesday, a late-night evacuation train carrying about 200 people stranded for days was also able to leave Hope.

Canadian air force arrives in British Columbia

Canadian forces have started arriving in British Columbia to help stranded residents and search areas hit by landslides and heavy flooding.

During the past few days, a powerful storm has dumped a month’s worth of rain across a swath of the Pacific north-west.

Canadian military personnel will assist with evacuation efforts in British Columbia. They will also assess the damage in an area that has largely been cut off.

Hello Readers. My name is Oliver Holmes and I’m starting a new live blog today, bringing you all the latest on the floods and landslides. If you see anything worth covering, please email me at: oliver.holmes@theguardian.com

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