FLOOD SPECIAL REPORT
SILVERA TIMES Silvera’s Community Newsletter – June 20 – July 31, 2013
SURVIVING THE FLOOD OF A LIFETIME
Flooded area around the Saddledome on Friday June 21, 2013.
It was supposed to be a typical mid-June rainstorm in the Rockies. But, by Wednesday, June 19, there was nothing typical about it. Intense, pounding rain had struck and water levels were rising. What had started in the Rocky Mountains wound its way through creeks and rivers, and by midweek the water started to swell the Bow and Elbow rivers.
SILVERA COMMUNITIES EVACUATED • Aspen Community • Spruce Community • Bow Valley Community • Willow Park on the Bow Community • Bow Valley Townhouses Community • Elmwood Court Community
Water-logged police car near Calgary Curling club in Sunnyside. The worst flood in Calgary’s history had begun, and Silvera for Seniors would soon be part of the drama. Early on Thursday, June 20, flood-watch advisories were issued for the Bow River Basin and just after 8 a.m. the City of Calgary activated its Emergency Operations Centre. An hour and a half later, the situation had worsened so quickly that a local state of emergency was declared. Some communities began to receive sandbags, while crews began desperately dumping dirt along the Elbow riverbanks in hopes of constructing water-blocking berms in time.
SILVERA COMMUNITIES ON EVACUATION ALERT • Dream Haven Community • Shouldice Community • Shouldice Manor I and II Community
silvera.ca | 403.276.5541
SILVERA PREPARES
With an ear to Environment Canada forecasts and City advisories, and an eye on the rising water level and speed flow on the Bow River, Silvera began to ready itself for potential flooding. Maintenance crews monitored our Bridgeland communities, climbing rooftops and going below ground to assess the potential for damage. Silvera crews were busy trying to determine our risk levels, given we operate five residences in Bridgeland, separated from the Bow by only a few blocks and Memorial Drive.
11 12 1 2 10 9 3 4 8 7 6 5
At 4 p.m. it looked like things were getting worse and an urgent conference call was arranged by Silvera CEO Arlene Adamson. This involved managers and directors from across the organization who were brought together to put a plan in place in case the City ordered an evacuation. Floor plans were pulled, emergency preparedness plans reviewed and different scenarios considered as Silvera staff prepared for something neither the organization nor the City had ever had to do in over 100 years: prepare for massive overland floods.
Nerves were running high as staff worked on balancing the importance of safety with the risk of uprooting and upsetting residents, many of whom have mobility challenges, or required special medication or oxygen tanks. We were also concerned about the sheer number of residents to relocate – nearly 600. Adding to the pressure was the unknown; would an evacuation be for a few days? A few weeks? Would our 600 residents be allowed to return home at all?
It was determined from the start that keeping staff, residents and residents’ families informed was crucial, so by Friday at 9 a.m. a call centre was set up, and Silvera’s website and social media communications were constantly being updated as events evolved.
The evacuation call came in the middle of the night, early on Friday, June 21, although residents had been on “alert” since late Thursday...
11 12 1 2 10 9 3 4 8 7 6 5
EVACUATION ORDER 3:30-5:00 a.m. Staff worked through the night transporting our residents to the evacuation centre at Canada Olympic Park (COP). Family and friends arrived to take many seniors to their homes.
12
11 1 5:00-11:00 a.m. 10 Silvera had to quickly find 9 beds for the 120 8 residents who were 7 6 5 not taken in by family and friends. Five area hotels, as well as a seniors’ apartment complex run by Boardwalk Retirement Communities, stepped up to the plate to provide rooms. 12
11 1 2 10 9 3 4 8 7 6 5
9:00 a.m. Silvera call centre set up.
11 12 1 2 10 9 3 4 8 7 6 5
11:00 a.m. – Silvera staff helped transport residents to hotels and apartments. Staff were reassigned from across the organization for 12-hour shifts at the hotels and apartments, as were homecare workers.
Due to the speed of the evacuation, some residents accidently left their medication behind, while others needed their oxygen tanks refilled. With the support of Apex Pharmacies, Homecare and of course dedicated Silvera staff, we managed all the extra challenges together.
Community Resident Manager Stacey Gavan helps Joseph McCullough to COP. School buses helped move our residents to and from COP.
2 silvera.ca | 403.276.5541
2 3 4
While CBI looked after the medical and health needs of residents through homecare, Silvera’s activity coordinators were tasked with keeping morale high as residents found themselves in unfamiliar surroundings. Mary-Ann Smulders, Activity Coordinator at Silvera’s Aspen Community, re-located to the Blackfoot Inn, says, “In order to help manage the anxiety and stress created by the evacuation, we worked to keep things as normal as possible for our residents. So, on a Monday night, usually we have exercises at 6:30 and ladies’ crafts at 7 p.m., and that is what we did while at the hotel.”
Water level with pump running
Usual water level
Silvera’s maintenance staff worked diligently to keep sump pumps operating in several of the Bridgeland buildings and damage was kept to a minimum, according to Community Maintenance Manager Brian Foley. “Our properties stayed dry all weekend, and we had power all weekend,” says Foley. “I think people take it for granted that there’s no problem when the surface water doesn’t breach. But the water table is just inches below the surface. We were taking in water and so we put sump pumps to work to keep the ground water out of the buildings.” Our neighbour across Memorial Drive, the Calgary Zoo, was almost completely swamped, and in some parts of Bridgeland the water was deep enough that a local newspaper photographed one woman who’d caught a fish outside her front door. Silvera’s properties were spared the worst of it, especially when compared with properties only a few blocks away that Foley says required two-inch hoses just to pump out the water.
Houses are partially submerged by the overflowing Bow River between the neighbourhoods of Montgomery and Bowness.
Residents don bicycles and umbrellas to survey the damage on the east end of 17th Avenue near the Stampede grounds.
June 21, 2013: The flooded Calgary Zoo was one of the hardest hit areas.
silvera.ca | 403.276.5541 3
EVACUATION LIFTED The evacuation order for Bridgeland was lifted on Sunday, June 23, but Silvera residents had to stay away a little longer when the power to the area was unexpectedly cut the next day. While emergency generators kept most of the sump pumps going, one building didn’t have one, and a below-ground mechanical room filled with six inches of water. Fortunately, Foley says damage was minimal.
With another huge effort and tremendous planning, by Tuesday, June 25, everyone was safely back in their Silvera homes as the lights came back on in Bridgeland.
Silvera’s staff worked long hours to help the evacuation run smoothly – even as many faced their own challenges. One of our staff, for example, had to take care of her parents, aunt and uncle, all displaced by the Silvera evacuation.
RESIDENTS TAKE EVACUATION IN STRIDE A 2:45 a.m. wake-up call is not pleasant for anyone, and it sure wasn’t for the close to 600 residents (average age 82) who live in one of the five Silvera for Seniors’ properties in Bridgeland. They were told to pack only their essentials and be ready to leave, because the Bow River was about the flood the area. “It came over the intercom – ‘Get a few things together, don’t forget your medications,’” says Florence Richard of the Aspen Community. “We knew it [the flood] was happening, but it never occurred that it would affect us and then, at the last minute, boom … the police came and told us to evacuate.”
And CEO Arlene Adamson was herself temporarily homeless as she was forced to evacuate her Kensington home due to the floods. “This flood was a real challenge, not only for our staff, but for our residents and their families. But everyone handled themselves incredibly and I have never been more proud of our Silvera staff and volunteers. And we’re very grateful to the hotels and Boardwalk for opening their doors to us and also to family and friends for stepping up to house many of our residents. We know it was difficult as many residents needed extra supports and had mobility challenges, and family homes often aren’t completely accessible.”
Florence Richard is writing a poem to capture her experience.
Arlene Adamson, CEO
“But most of all, we are proud of our residents as they were the real troopers during the crisis. We temporarily relocated some 600 of our residents on short notice and returned them all safe and sound back to their homes. And that is the most important thing.”
Community Resident Manager Fred Burrill with Resident Ron Roughly.
One resident at Bow Valley Community, Helge Daly, was given so little notice, he left his walker behind. “I was okay, but I didn’t have my walker!” he jokes. Another Bow Valley resident, Wilfrid Erikson, says he’d seen the water level rising the day before and worried they’d be evacuating. “They laughed at me when I said this river is going to be here. No one ever thought it would raise that high!” he says.
The dam on Glenmore Reservoir desperately tries to keep ahead of the floodwaters of the Elbow river by opening all of its spillways.
4 silvera.ca | 403.276.5541
By the time the buses rolled up around 11 a.m., the seniors were tired, exhausted, cold, and, to make things worse, many had difficulty boarding the school buses. But they knew that we had to go. The residents were transported to five area hotels – Blackfoot Inn, Country Inn & Suites, Holiday Inn Calgary-Airport, Delta Calgary South, and Carriage House Inn – as well as to the Boardwalk Retirement Community, a seniors’ apartment block. Evacuee Brigitte Dresel-Roesler says being kept informed was very important and credits Silvera staff for keeping everyone in the loop.
Major roadways, such as Glenmore Trail, see considerable damage.
Silvera asked residents to call family or friends if they had anyone who could house them. Jack Gammel of Spruce Community found himself at a loss as to who to call. “I have a grandson in Airdrie, but working; I have a daughter in the south, but I didn’t know if they were home; but my granddaughter was,” Gammel recalls. “When I phoned her, she said, ‘Pick up your stuff, we’ll be right there.’ I couldn’t figure out how she knew! But she was driving around looking at flooded areas and they had the radio going and heard Bridgeland.”
“Everybody was pretty calm,” she says. “I didn’t see anybody that was nervous about anything because we had all the information that was needed at the time … if we needed to know something, they informed us about everything.” “Seniors told us they were confident Silvera would sort through the challenges and that we cared deeply for their well-being,” says Sarah Price, Director of Service. That’s something Staff Sgt. Paul Collinson saw firsthand. He is with the British Army, and got permission to leave exercises at CFB Suffield to help his mother, Betty, when he heard of the evacuations. “I tried calling her suite and she wasn’t home, so I started getting concerned,” Collinson says. “I spoke to a relative on Facebook and she said my mother had been evacuated, and that was a bit of a shock. I spoke immediately to my commanding officer and said I need to get to Calgary.”
Approximately 400 residents were picked up by family or friends after the evacuation order was issued.
Staff Sgt. Paul Collinson and his Mom, Betty.
Aspen resident Edith Cowan getting picked up by her daughter, Barb. The remaining residents spent several uncomfortable hours at COP waiting for Silvera to plan their next move. Many were fragile, with some running out of oxygen in their portable tanks. All were exhausted. While the residents sat or laid on cots, wondering if they would have a home to return to, Silvera staff were busy trying to secure buses and hotels to ensure temporary accommodations. It was clear that our seniors would not be able to manage in the evacuation centre for long and their health would begin to fail. It was critical to get a stable environment and coordinate homecare immediately.
Mother and son were successfully reunited and stayed at a home in Canyon Meadows until the all-clear was sounded.
According to Silvera CEO Arlene Adamson, “The families were terrific. Their support and fast response meant the organization didn’t need to find emergency accommodation for all of the 600 residents in Bridgeland. The evacuation would have been much harder without them.”
Community Resident Manager Sandi Dionne and Kathy Secord, Dining Services Supervisor at Shawnessy are pleased residents are coming home. Once she got back home, Florence Richard, a budding author at age 94, started working on a poem to commemorate her experience. “We have to record it somehow and what better way?” she asks. Gammel puts it all into perspective: “It was a big thing, but … when you try to compare that to some of the hurricanes that go on in the south, those people don’t even have a building left to crawl into.”
Residents returning home to Bow Valley Community.
Adamson’s final words sum it up:
“Many Calgarians still need housing after the flood. At Silvera, we were lucky we could get back into all of our five communities and get our seniors back home, stable and safe. It was very challenging to move that many seniors and traumatic for them as many have limited mobility, need supports, and have specialized health needs. Silvera’s staff really pulled together from all across the organization to go from crisis, to stability, and then back to home.” silvera.ca | 403.276.5541 5
INTERESTING FACTS 101 the age of the oldest person
to be evacuated – Violet Prew
BEST…byRETWEET Mayor Nenshi BARRIER-FREE SHOWERS …item most missed by our residents while away from home. $210,000
…the early estimated costs incurred excluding staffing costs.
$500
… amount donated by Ontario man who read about Silvera’s evacuation in The Globe and Mail.
BREE FOSTER …our youngest volunteer at age 7. PIZZA …most popular food consumed at the Call Centre. BEST THANK YOU …from Silvera’s own resident, Lawrence Potapoff.
FROM VOLUNTEERS TO FOOD VENDORS, WHEN SILVERA FOR SENIORS SOUNDED THE CALL FOR HELP, MANY PEOPLE STEPPED UP TO THE PLATE.
Flight attendant and student Amanda Arbuthnot was evacuated
from her apartment in the Beltline when the June 2013 flood hit. But when she heard that Silvera’s seniors in Bridgeland had also been displaced from their homes, she didn’t hesitate to lend a hand. At the Blackfoot Hotel, where some of the 600 evacuated residents were housed, Arbuthnot assisted with room-to-room communications, letting seniors know what was happening. She even drove to a second-hand shop to buy one resident a clean pair of pants. Later, she helped calm frayed nerves when traffic delayed the bus sent to take the seniors home. Food is always a priority and during the emergency, Kim Jesse at Sysco was in constant touch with Silvera’s Dining
Services Manager Nathalie Fleury throughout the weekend of the flood —
6 silvera.ca | 403.276.5541
even though she was also working with hospitals in hard-hit “red zones” such as High River and Canmore — to make sure Silvera residents and staff had everything they needed.
Jennifer Seutter of GFS Canada
went out of her way to ensure extra food was provided to Silvera’s Westview Community, where staff put together lunches and suppers for evacuated residents housed at Country Inn & Suites. Seutter even drove a borrowed catering truck, shuttling meals across the city.
Rodger Mycroft of Birkby Foods
was another shining star, offering the use of his company’s trucks and drivers to move prepared food to residents if needed. Days after the residents were safely returned home, Mycroft was still offering his services as a volunteer.
And the team at An Affair to Remember came out in force, offering food for 300 people at the evacuation staging area at Canada Olympic
Park. An Affair’s Elizabeth Olsen
even offered to take three or four seniors home with her and also offered to make sandwiches. The company even offered Silvera’s dining services staff access to its kitchens.
Apex Pharmacies responded quickly to fill emergency prescriptions for medications that were left behind.
These are only a few examples of the people and organizations that came forward to support Silvera and its residents during a flood no one will ever forget.
OUR STAFF & PARTNERS
– STORIES FROM THE FRONT LINE The Great Flood of 2013 will be remembered for years to come, not least by the many Silvera staff members who helped in the evacuation – as well as others impacted by the flood. Here are just some of their stories. Yves Ruest, Community Resident Assistant Manager, Valleyview and Bow Valley Communities, recalls how residents helped each other during the crisis:
“At the Country Inn & Suites, a resident approached me and was concerned he wasn’t going to have enough power from his electric wheelchair battery to get him through the day. My first thought was to somehow go and retrieve the charger from his suite … then, a fellow resident passed by in her wheelchair. She was more than happy to help the resident and lend him her charger. It touched my heart to see fellow residents backing each other up and helping each other out.”
Sarah Price, Director of Service: “Shortly after it was
announced that High River was completely underwater, Silvera received a call from Foothills Foundation CEO Lauren Ingalls. They were in need of emergency housing
for seniors from Nanton who were also displaced
Debra Collins, HR & Benefits Coordinator, on
keeping residents occupied while waiting for the buses to take them home: “Another team member and I decided to engage the folks by leading some simple yoga exercises. Someone – I believe it was me! – started chanting, in time with the bending/stretching, ‘Bring on the bus,’ ‘Bring on the bus’. At which point many residents immediately picked this up and, within seconds, there was a resounding chorus: ‘Bring on the bus, bring on the bus, bring on the bus!’ We were all laughing and
because of the flooding. Silvera had space at Shawnessy Community for six of their seniors. Shawnessy’s south Calgary location meant the travel time for the seniors was reduced and it allowed families to visit from the evacuated area. We continue to work with other seniors’ housing providers to support emergency accommodation.”
enjoying ourselves, releasing a lot of pent-up anxiety.”
Dorothy Britten, Community Resident Assistant Manager, Bow Valley Community: “Two of our male residents
where we were staying at the hotels, but there is no place like home’.”
were assigned to share a room with a king-sized bed. They were from the ‘Macho Generation’ and could not be caught sleeping in the same bed, even with a towel dividing the space!
We spoke with the Delta South hotel staff and they installed a cot for the room. The men flipped a coin for the cot, because the bed was difficult to get into.”
Karen Sampson, Activity Coordinator, Shouldice
Community, drove one of the buses that transported evacuees back home: “The cheers when I would pull up to the hotels, and the even louder cheers and looks of
relief when we drove into their community, was overwhelming.”
Sandra Carras, Reception/Administrative Assistant, Bow Valley Community: “When we had finally
got our seniors back, they were so happy, the words I heard were: ‘They treated us like kings and queens
Gaurav Malik, Director of Operations – Calgary, CBI Home Health “We were proud to assist Silvera
during this challenging time. Through our strong partnership and amazing back and forth communication, we were able to ensure that residents received the care that they needed from both CBI and Silvera. Although there was many challenges, Silvera staff and CBI staff
worked side by side all day and night, with one united purpose. It was great to see the strength of our
partnership at its best, when the need was at its highest.”
Jim Hubbard, Silvera Board Chairperson
“I’m so proud to be associated with Silvera because our staff moved ‘heaven and earth’ to care for our seniors during this very moving and potentially disastrous event. Everyone is now back HOME.”
silvera.ca | 403.276.5541 7
THANK YOU TO SILVERA’S FLOOD HEROES! An Affair to Remember Apex Pharmacies Ltd. Birkby Food Service Blackfoot Inn Boardwalk Retirement Community Carriage House Inn CBI Home Health – Calgary Country Inn & Suites Delta Calgary South GFS Calgary Holiday Inn Airport Southland Transportation Sysco Calgary Vitalaire And thank-you to any others who we may have inadvertently missed. It was a crazy, busy time and we needed and appreciated you all!
Editor, Silvana Saccomani MA, ABC (Accredited Business Communicator)
WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Do you have a story to tell? Have a comment about something in this issue? We want to hear from you! 8 silvera.ca | 403.276.5541
E-mail us at times@silvera.ca, phone 403.567.5308 or write us at Silvera Times, c/o Silvera for Seniors, 804-7015 Macleod Tr. S.W., Calgary, AB, T2H 2K6 (attn. Silvana Saccomani).