North West River Road reopened, communities reconnected
All traffic is now allowed to travel Route 520
The road to North West River and Sheshatshiu has reopened after heavy flooding closed it, cutting off both communities for about a day.
Rte 520 has reopened to all traffic. <a href="https://twitter.com/TW_GovNL">@TW_GovNL</a> advises motorists to use caution <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/nltraffic?src=hash">#nltraffic</a>
—@TW_GovNLAt peak flood, waters rose in the four-to-five foot range, according to the Department of Transportation and Works.
Emergency measures
Earlier Saturday, the province brought in a helicopter to fly people needing immediate and serious medical attention to the hospital in Happy Valley-Goose Bay.
The flooded stretch of Route 520, or North West River Road, was closed to vehicular traffic Friday evening. Emergency vehicles were taken off the road Saturday Morning.
Labrador-Grenfell Health opened the Mani Ashini Clinic for less serious medical cases.
Families stuck on the wrong side
About 20 families weren't able to make it home to North West River and Shehsatshiu on Friday night.
"We just stayed for a little bit watching the road," said Harley Jacque, 13, about what happened when her family got a knock on their car window alerting them of the road closure.
Salvation Army says it's served hundreds. Initially set up to help NWR/Sheshatshiu people but HVGB residents have come b/c of outage <a href="https://t.co/fJaJHWA2rn">pic.twitter.com/fJaJHWA2rn</a>
—@KatieBreenNL"Then we decided to come [to the hotel] just to sleep for the night."
Labrador Inn housed many of the stranded families.
The Salvation Army set up a barbecue in the hotel's parking lot for the people who had been stranded.
The group ended up serving hundreds as the entire region — Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Sheshatshiu and North West River — was without power due to an unplanned, regional outage that has since been resolved.
The flood
The flooding was in two sections of Route 520, or North West River Road, near Goose River Bridge.
There is another, more flooded section past this one. Trimper estimates about 1 km of road underwater <a href="https://t.co/tEeCQgit2S">pic.twitter.com/tEeCQgit2S</a>
—@KatieBreenNL"Just sort of the west of the bridge, that's where it's quite dramatic," MHA Perry Trimper said of the formerly larger section, closer to the cut-off communities.
He estimated that, combined, about a kilometre of roadway had been underwater.
What a difference from morning. Stick set here to measure water levels now completely dry - shoulder of the road completely gone here <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cbcnl?src=hash">#cbcnl</a> <a href="https://t.co/1FSLIEDXz7">pic.twitter.com/1FSLIEDXz7</a>
—@JacobBarkerCBCThe cause
The flooding happened because of warm temperatures and spring melt, according to the Department of Transportation and Works.
MHA Perry Trimper doesn't connect it to the Muskrat Falls hydro project.
"It's a whole different watershed," said the former Environment Minister.
"Goose River watershed is flowing from kind of the North West of us, a completely different system, so there'd be no influence at all."