Hundreds in Peguis First Nation flee homes as rising Fisher River floods community
CBC
Flooding has forced hundreds of people living in Peguis First Nation to leave their homes after local officials issued a mandatory evacuation order on Sunday.
A total of 920 people are now in hotels in Winnipeg.
Chief Glenn Hudson said he has never seen flooding this bad.
"It's worse than the 2011 flood, which was a huge event for us in terms of flooding, but I believe this is probably one of the worst on record," he told Marcy Markusa, host of CBC Manitoba morning radio show Information Radio.
The Interlake community, 160 kilometres north of Winnipeg, is the most populous First Nation in the province with around 11,000 members, 4,800 of whom live in the community.
Areas in the Interlake and east of Lake Winnipeg received an average of 30 to 50 millimetres of precipitation over the weekend, after a month of enormous rain and snowfall that has already saturated the ground, Manitoba Transportation and Infrastructure said.
Over the weekend, ice jams at the mouth of the Fisher River caused water levels to rise behind them and flow over roads, flooding the community despite sandbagging efforts.
"There has been many homes that have been breached," Hudson said.
"Where a majority of these homes are in the centre of the community along the Fisher River, many of those homes have been surrounded by water."
There are 480 homes surrounded by floodwater near the Fisher River, he said.
Buses have taken people out of the community and into Winnipeg.
Elsie Yanik Catholic School in Fort McMurray, Alta., has been trying to build a teepee for a long time, according to the school's Indigenous liaison Michelle Janvier.
The Cree Nation of Mistissini and the government of Quebec signed an agreement to create the first national park in Eeyou Istchee, called Nibiischii Park, which translates to "land of water."
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