For the second year in a row, Hay River – Vale Island, specifically – has largely avoided significant flooding.
There is one major exception since the 2 Seasons Adventures campground, which is not on Vale Island, has once again been hit hard by flooding, as it was in August of last year.
However, aside from 2 Seasons Adventures, Hay River seemed to escape fairly unscathed from this year’s spring breakup, especially when compared to the hard-hit Fort Simpson and Jean Marie River.
That makes two years in a row that flooding was feared – expected, actually – and Vale Island has been evacuated, but no flooding occurred on the island.
Of course, that is a good thing, but there also has to be concern about what that will mean in the future if and when there is another threat of flooding and an evacuation is called. Will there be even more people who decide to stay on the island despite an evacuation order because of two evacuations, but no flooding?
This year, many people decided to stay on Vale Island. That is their right, because even though an evacuation order from the Town of Hay River is called an ‘order’ it is not really that. It is not mandatory, and is really more of an advisory to let people know they may be in harm’s way and it is probably in their best interests to evacuate.
People stayed on Vale Island despite the Hay River looking downright dangerous. Everyone knew that the water in the river and on Great Slave Lake has been high all year, and the river looked full to the gunnels as breakup occurred.
When the evacuation order was issued on May 7, there was water lapping over the top of Fisherman’s Wharf, and the Porritt Landing recreational area and the Canadian Coast Guard harbour were covered by water.
Yet even with those ominous signs, and an ice-filled river, many people on Vale Island decided to stay put in their homes.
They all had their own personal reasons for doing so. Perhaps their properties had never flooded in the past, perhaps they wanted to stay and protect their belongings, perhaps they believed that there would be no flooding, like last year.
As it turned out, anyone who did not believe there would be flooding was right.
However, that was just a lucky guess, as opposed to some insight into the behaviour of the river during breakup.
If there is one thing that long-term residents of this community know it is that the Hay River during breakup is a completely unpredictable beast.
And that brings us back to not evacuating despite the threat of flooding.
Anyone who ignores an evacuation order in the future is truly doing so at their own peril.
Obviously, it is a very good thing that Vale Island escaped significant flooding this year, but that does not really teach any lesson for the future.
If an evacuation order happens to be issued next year or in any of the following years, Vale Island residents should not recall what happened in 2020 and 2021.
Things could be very different next time.
No lessons can be learned from previous years about when to evacuate or not evacuate.