If that much precipitation had fallen on snow, it would have been OK, but it sure didn’t. “With all that rain and our forest fires, there was nothing to absorb or stop the water and mud from draining down,” said Jenny. Two rivers – Nicola and Coldwater – flow through Merritt but the Coldwater collected water from the same weather system that moved up the Coquihalla and it was the only one of the two that overflowed its banks in the city during a torrential downpour that lasted nearly four days. There was so much debris floating down our road, there were garbage cans, recycle bins, logs, and we were nervous that water was getting in our travel trailer as we pushed through.” “When we started getting ready to leave I took a picture of our yard and home at 5:03 and there was no water near our driveway or lawn, and I have a second picture where I was pulling out of the driveway 12 minutes later at 5:15 and I was pushing through the water down my street with water coming over the hood of my SUV.
“We went from slowly moving around the house packing what we thought we needed to seeing the water breech its banks behind our house and then only having minutes to get in the cars and out,” said Jenny. They realized their chicken coop was about to be flooded so they threw their seven chickens into the dog carriers and drove away on the flooded street to head for Jenny’s parents’ house on higher ground, thinking they’d be back to normal in a week at most. Jenny and Jesse rounded up their eight-year-old daughter Charlee and 10-year-old son Covin and put them in the vehicle with their dog Po, a Boston Terrier/miniature schnauzer. “If I had left any later I would have been stuck.
“It was pretty scary for me because my car is so low to the ground and the water was coming up to my windshield and going over the roof,” Astorino said. It was coming so fast and the water was strong.”īy the time Astorino got into his car, the rushing water was already lapping at the doors and as soon as he backed out of the driveway and started down the road his car was half-submerged. It was like nothing, to water almost in the house in 20 minutes. “So I went back to my room for a bit and I heard (Jenny) yelling, ‘OK, we’ve got to go, we’ve got to go,’ and it happened within five minutes. “I didn’t really pack as much stuff as I probably should have, and when I looked outside the water was starting to get a little worse, but it wasn’t serious,” said Astorino. As a third-generation Merritt resident, Jenny knew the house her grandparents built was prone to flooding occasionally, because it was only a short walk from the river, and Jesse told Blake they would likely be back later that day when the water level dropped.
Little house on the prairie complete series kickasstorrents torrent#
and the flood waters hadn’t reached the end of the driveway but within 15 minutes, nature’s fury was lapping at their feet and waves rippled as a torrent of rising water enveloped their yard. The 20-year-old forward phoned his parents, Patty and Ed, in Prince George to let them know what was happening and started loading what he could into his Honda Civic, while Jenny and her husband Jesse grabbed what they could to pack into their SUV and travel trailer. His billet mom, Jenny Pierce, told Blake to start packing up his belongings and reminded him to gather up his suit and dress clothes because the Cents had a game scheduled for Wednesday in Penticton. Rushing water from the flooding Coldwater River a short distance from the house had risen over the banks and was creeping toward the house in the south end of Merritt where he’s been billeted as a member of the Merritt Centennials hockey team. Blake Astorino woke up early last Monday morning in his basement bedroom in Merritt not knowing one of the scariest days of his life was just beginning.