A Devastating Turn of Events

Sept 9/12

Sept 10/12
THE DAY AFTER :(

On the early evening of Sept 10 (last night) we had a devastating storm rip through our area with winds moving in the 90-100 km/hr speed.  Lots of rain came with it and then the dreaded hail!

The wind shredded the overhang of our train station and knocked off its chimney as it flew to the other side

The mess to clean up, just so thankful it never flew into our house

All that this station has been through and it doesn't survive this!

Heavy blocks of the chimney

Hemaruka Flood of 2012

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As I was away visiting in Terrace at the end of June this is what I missed at home!

The Effects of the Storm

Today I drove over to Lawrence and Debbie's place to get some pictures. His was the hardest place hit with hail and he got around 4 1/2 inches of rain in less than 30 minutes. How sad what I saw! This was some of the ditches along the highway as I drove to Lawrence's.
The road started washing away.

Water gushing out of the culverts!

The hail damaged Cat Tails, no longer standing.

Here is the scene at Great Grandpa Letniak's and Uncle Lawrence's place!

Debbie finally has lake-view front! :(

The "once beautiful" field straight south of Lawrence and Debbie's house - now COMPLETELY flattened!

The torn-up grass in the ditches. Hail still on the north side of their house just about 24 hrs later- and Lawrence STILL manages to keep a smile on his face!

I'm sorry Debbie!! This is/was her garden - how sad!

Great Grandpa's garden!

As I was leaving a VERY fitting rainbow (and promise) enclosed Lawrence's farm. It is amazing how God talks to us and we do have to remember His promise even when things seem to be at their worst!

The rainbow encompassing their homes!

"I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life." Genesis 9: 13-15

Severe Alberta Weather

These pictures were from an email that was sent to me showing a TERRIBLE wind storm that happened around the Medicine Hat, AB area July 15th, 2008. Thank goodness none of that touched us around here. Medicine Hat is just over 2 hours from us. This is getting a little close to home for me!

The email read:

I bet you'll get a kick out of these photos, this was of a storm that went through Med Hat and took out 80 structures (power poles) about 20 feet in the air. Some of these bales are rolled over 5 miles apparently and some are just sunk to the bottom in the irrigation canal.
FYI, not a tornado but a wind storm with similar wind speeds as an F2 tornado (113-157 MPH). The Pictures with the round bales are amazing!

Wish Us Luck!

Tomorrow Jaren and I are taking a "vacation" home to Terrace, BC. We are looking forward to spending quality time with mom and dad but...............................as you can see from the pictures below the quality time might be spent sandbagging!!!! It sure is a good thing that we are flying because the highway from the east coming into Terrace and the highway heading west to Prince Rupert are both closed due to the high water! We will try and update our blog while we are on our visit but I am not too sure if we will be able to get to Grandpa's computer! You may want to remember us in your prayers over the next week! I think I just might keep Jaren's life vest on him ALL the time that we are there! :)

Highway 16 heading west to Prince Rupert

Skeena River and a view of the New Bridge

Above: Skeena River - The Old Bridge
What an awesome picture!!
Above: Kalum River

No where to go!

Terrace Flood Update From My Dad

This is the view looking down the end of our street at the Skeena River. I believe that Dad took this picture from only 2 houses down from ours! We'll definitely have to remember Jaren's life vest now!!

Quoting from Dad's email this afternoon:
Here's some pictures I just took of the island just down the road. We were
able to move the piano out this afternoon. I guess earl's house is only a
matter of inches before he has any of the water. The river is supposed to
peak at 13.0 m tonight.

You know I'm starting to hate that song "How high is the water momma"

Upon talking to mom tonight she said that only 25% of the snow in the mountains has melted thus far still leaving, yes........75% to go!!!!

Thanks Mom & Dad for saving my piano!!

From Slides to Major Flood Watches & Warnings!

From major slides to flooding in the Terrace area. Our visit home this next week could be VERY interesting. Dad sent me these pictures today of the Skeena River. Normally under the Old Bridge we have a large rock area that can be identified where that little clump of trees are in middle of the river. I hope that the rest of the snow melt is fairly slow to avoid this major catastrophe that could potentially happen!

Terrace, B.C. - Skeena River

Thought We Had Problems!!

My mom and dad emailed me these pictures this afternoon of a slide that happened on the highway 45 km east of Terrace. They said that it is about 2 stories high! At least with the amount of moisture that we are getting in Alberta we aren't having 1/2 of mountains falling down on us! Here is a copy of the email that my mom had sent me - explains it a little better:

Our road is closed between Terrace and Kitwanga....we had a slide this morning at 9:00am. Not sure when it will open, I hear it is 70' wide and over 200' deep. Thought you might be interested. It takes a while to open as it is a large file.

Mom

All I can say is that I am happy that Jaren & I are flying to Terrace next week and not driving - we may not have gotten there!

Legate Creek Slide