Flooding, sewage backups threaten Kashechewan

About 800 Elders, vulnerable people, pregnant women, youth and their escorts have been evacuated from Kashechewan due to a high risk of flooding on the Albany River.
“They’re not taking any risks this year — they just called for a full-scale evacuation,” said Sheperd Wynne, Kashechewan’s youth coordinator for health services and community liaison in Thunder Bay for the evacuees. “We flew in yesterday in four flights. It was already planned; no rushing.”
Wynne said about 150 community members were evacuated to Thunder Bay and about 350 to Cornwall on May 5. About 240 community members had previously been evacuated to Kapuskasing on May 1 after Kashechewan declared a state of emergency on April 30 over flooded basements in 40 homes from sewer backups.
“And the planes are probably in the air going to Cornwall (today with more evacuees),” Wynne said on May 6.
Emergency Management Ontario announced that about 350 people would be evacuated to Cornwall on May 6 and plans were being drafted to evacuate most of the about 760 remaining community members.
“It was tiring because you had to wait long and the flights were delayed,” said Jennifer Wynne, an IV coordinator, about the May 5 evacuation to Thunder Bay.
Although Jennifer’s children were enjoying the swimming pool at the Victoria Inn, she was waiting for her parents to arrive from Kingston.
“I just want to thank Thunder Bay for taking us in in a time of crisis,” Jennifer said. “And thank you to everybody who is helping out in our situation.”
William Nakogee, a former Canadian Ranger, questioned why the community was not moved to higher terrain upriver on the Albany or out to the Timmins area.
“We could have been sitting peacefully now, no worries about the evacuation,” Nakogee said. “Me and my family, we wanted to move either down south or upriver where the higher ground is.”
Nakogee said the upriver location is about 20-30 kilometres up the Albany River, and still on reserve land.
“It’s higher there, safer,” Nakogee said.
Nakogee said this year’s risk of flooding is higher due to higher snowfalls over the winter.
“Last year was OK because the river wasn’t that bad,” Nakogee said. “But this year the water went up all of a sudden. There was a lot of snow this year and lots of water coming down, but there was hardly no ice on the river.”
Nakogee said the 2006 evacuation lasted from April to August.
“That was the major breakup in Kash,” Nakogee said. “I hope it’s not going to be that long — I’m going to miss my food.”
Meanwhile, the federal government committed on April 8 to provide funding to Kashechewan, to be finalized after a competitive tendering process, to support a study of flood mitigating options on the Albany River.