The city of Châteauguay declared a state of emergency on Thursday after the previous day’s torrential freezing rain left as many as 16,000 homes without power. The basements of at least 200 homes would be flooded, with fears of 10,000 more, while half of the pumping stations are no longer powered by the grid.
Posted at 12:23pm
“It’s not decreasing, it’s increasing and it’s very worrying,” said the city’s mayor, Eric Allard, in an interview.
The network of Châteauguay would no longer deliver, while 20 of the approximately 44 pumping stations in the municipality are no longer powered by the electricity grid but by generators.
The city has received at least 200 calls from citizens whose basements are currently flooded, while about 10,000 could also meet the same fate. “This is very, very worrying,” Mayor Allard said.
” Flow [Châteauguay] has been very high since yesterday. It’s currently under control and we’re constantly monitoring it as it increases the risk, but what’s worrying us at the moment is our sewage system,” he explains.
Thanks to the state of emergency, the city will be able to spend more money than usual to order new generators and additional portable pumps to relieve its sewer system and provide emergency power for its pumping stations.
“It’s going to be quite expensive, but we need to be able to make those expenses quickly. That’s why we declared a state of emergency,” said Eric Allard.
More details to come.