Residents, councillors concerned about climate in wake of flash floods

It took four pumps one sump pump, one gas pumpandtwo submersible pumps for Andrew Oliver tokeep his basement dry.

Even though he rents hisapartment onKarn Place in Alta Vista, Oliverpurchased the pumps himself.

Thenhe ran them for hours on Thursday, desperately trying to clear the water.

"We're stuck with four pumps going and trying to keep up with it," Olivertold CBCyesterday afternoon. "This is the first year that the rain has been the worst."

A severe thunderstorm hitOttawa Thursday afternoon, bringing hail, power outages and flash floods to a wide swath of the city.

Emergency responders closed roadsin areas that experienced theworst flooding, as some drivers were forced to abandon submerged vehicles in the street.

Left thousands without power

About 77millimetres of rain fell on Ottawa ina matter of hours, according to Environment Canada. That'smore than any other Aug. 10 on record, but surroundingregions saw even more, receivingbetween 80 and 110millimetres.

At the storm's peak,Hydro Ottawa reported 24,000 customers without power.

Mycah Katz was practicing a drag performance in thebasement lounge of his condo buildingwhen the power cut out.

It was the first time since he moved to the building, nearBaseline Road and Clyde Avenue, that he'd experienced an outage.

Katz said climate change and related extreme weather havehim "very concerned."

• 4 tornadoes hit eastern Ontario on day of Barrhaven storm, investigators find

• Scenes from the hailstorm that hit Ottawa-Gatineau

"I think people want to do things, but they don't really know what, " he said."It might be too late."

City must become 'more resilient,' councillors say

River Coun. Riley Brockington said after the storm, his ward resembledthe Italian city of Venice.

"The streets became canals with such a heavy downpour," he said. "Our city's rainwater infrastructure cannot handle such volumes."

Many residents reported flooded basements, garages"infiltrated with water," and other damage to their homes, Brockington said.

It was partlybecause the bulk of the rain fell during a tight90-minute window, he said.

"This feeds into continued conversations about how the city can become more resilient, how our infrastructure can be renewed," said Brockington.

WATCH | Ottawa councillor says preparing for emergencies 'top of mind' after Thursday's hail, flooding:

Ottawa councillor says preparing for emergencies 'top of mind' after Thursday's hail, flooding

1 year ago

Duration 0:55

Coun. Riley Brockington, chair of the city's emergency preparedness and protective services committee, says he's looking at ways the city can be better prepared for an increase in extreme weather events like the storm that passed Thursday.

Knoxdale-Merivale Coun. Sean Devine agreed that funding for infrastructure and emergency servicesmust reflect a new climate "reality."

"It seems like we have to keep on writing a new playbook, because now we need to add a new chapter to our emergency playbook, which is dealing with sudden flash floods," Devine said.

• Councillor lauds new tool to co-ordinate emergency response

Alta Vista Coun. Marty Carr said older areas of the citysuch as her ward, where several main streets were shut down Thursday,require infrastructureupgrades and an updated sewer system.

But those updates won't be a silver bullet, she said.

"They do help minimize the impacts of severe climate events in the community," Carr said. "But they're not able to mitigate them completely."