“Major flooding” expected

Brett Thoms
Pontiac April 17, 2023
The Ottawa River Regulation Planning Board (ORRPB), the intergovernmental organization charged with managing and monitoring the conditions of the Ottawa River, has warned of major flooding of the Ottawa River from Lake Coulonge to Montreal starting Wednesday, April 19.
According to ORRPB the combination of high temperatures causing rapid snow melt upstream and precipitation is causing the water level of the Ottawa River to rise.
Major flooding is defined by the ORRPB as “the level at which one or several streets are beginning to flood, with several houses/buildings or neighborhoods being affected.”
The Coulonge River is also experiencing a water level raise for the same reasons as the Ottawa River.
The Municipality of Mansfield-et-Pontefract is distributing sandbags to residents at risk of flooding from both rivers and has already put out a call for volunteers to help fill them up help on Monday afternoon.
At the time of this report, no residences have been affected by the flood and all roads remain open in Mansfield. There are regular updates on the situation in the municipality being posted on the Mansfield-et-Pontefract’s Facebook page.
Downriver, the Municipality of Pontiac is also offering residents sandbags at its municipal garage.
While the ORRPB currently predicts water levels to remain well below historical flood levels on the main stem of the Ottawa River, they did warn that if higher than predicted levels of perception occur upstream and overwhelm the reservoirs, river levels downstream could eventually be much higher than those currently forecast.