The floods have forced hundreds of people living in Peguis First Nation to flee their homes after local authorities issued a mandatory evacuation order on Sunday.
A total of 920 people are already in hotels in Winnipeg.
Chief Glenn Hudson said he had never seen such severe flooding.
“It’s worse than the 2011 flood, which was a huge event for us in terms of the floods, but I believe it’s probably one of the worst in history,” he told Marcy Marcusa, a morning radio host. broadcast on CBC Manitoba Information Radio.
The Interlake community, 160 kilometers north of Winnipeg, is the province’s most densely populated first nation with about 11,000 members, 4,800 of whom live in the community.
Areas in Interlake and east of Lake Winnipeg received an average of 30 to 50 millimeters of rain over the weekend, after a month of heavy rain and snowfall that have already saturated the land, the Manitoba Transportation and Infrastructure Company said.
Over the weekend, ice jams at the mouth of the Fisher River led to rising water levels and overflowing roads, flooding the community despite efforts to collect sand and deploy Tiger dams.
A barrier from the Tiger Dam protects a flood-prone home of the Peguis First Nation. Chief Glenn Hudson says this year’s flood may be the worst the community has ever seen. (Peguis First Nation / Facebook)
“There are a lot of homes that have been broken into,” Hudson said.
There are 480 houses near the Fisher River surrounded by floods, he said.
Other houses in remote areas have been torn apart by flooding over roads. There are at least six roads that are inaccessible due to flooding, Hudson said.
“Where roads are paved, people can’t get out,” he said.
“So when it comes to emergency services like ambulance, fire, etc., RCMP, these roads are completely cut off.
Buses take people out of the Winnipeg community.
Several roads in Peguis First Nation are flooded. (Peguis First Nation / Facebook)
A spokesman for the Canadian Red Cross told CBC News that Peguis is the only community currently assisting in the evacuation.
Hudson said the community has done the best it can with its evacuation efforts, but they were surprised after initial forecasts showed little risk of severe flooding.
“I know I’ve received a lot of calls and messages from people about fear of water because they obviously haven’t seen this level of event before.”
Manitoba’s first flood bulletin warning of a Fisher River flood was released on Friday.
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