Paddlers locate statue of giant hand that was carried away by swollen river

A statue of a hand that disappeared after it washed off the bank of a swollen river in Winnipeg earlier this week has been rescued, thanks to a group of canoeists and kayakers who set out Saturday to find it.

A statue of a hand that disappeared after it washed off the bank of a swollen river in Winnipeg earlier this week has been rescued, thanks to a group of canoeists and kayakers who set out Saturday to find it.

Charles Burchill, an avid Winnipeg paddler, said word got out that the fibreglass hand which stands taller than a person, was no longer on the bank of the Seine River in Winnipeg.

Paddlers said the statue has been on the bank not far from the city's Perimeter Highway for more than a decade on the property of a museum worker who saved the former exhibit from the garbage.

"I think it's one of those things that everybody, when they paddle down that end of the river, looks for. It's a landmark that's kind of fun to see on the shore," Burchill said in a phone interview Saturday.

Flood watches and advisories have been in effect in Manitoba for a couple of weeks, although the spot where the statue sits is downstream from where Seine River passes through a channel underneath the Red River Floodway. When flows get strong on the Seine, much of the excess water gets channelled off into the floodway, regulating the flow further downstream.

Still, Burchill said the river had been higher than usual earlier this week, likely tipping the hand over and carrying it off. How far it had gone was unknown, he said.

On Saturday morning, two canoes and two people on open-topped kayaks launched on the Seine River to look for it. Burchill said they got about 600 metres downstream, where they spotted the giant hand floating against a downed tree.