Heavy rain flooded several rivers in Quebec

Quebec officials reported flooding in several rivers north of Montreal and in Quebec City after torrential rains lashed parts of the province this week.

On Saturday, the municipality of Sainte-Emelie-de-l'Énergie declared a state of emergency after rising water levels cut off road traffic for about 100 households. The state of emergency will remain in place until at least Sunday morning.

Marc Andre Forget is among the residents affected by the floods. He has lived in the municipality for three years and his house has been flooded twice.

“I was devastated because this was where I retired, and now it's like a bad dream,” he said.

In St. Jerome, Que., about 50 kilometers northwest of downtown Montreal, water flows of more than 260 cubic meters per second led the province's Department of Public Safety to classify the flooding in the Rivière du Nord as “major” Saturday morning. Officials recorded a flow of only 64 cubic meters per second in the same river three days ago.

The department noted “moderate” flooding in four other rivers and minor flooding at six other water level monitoring stations in the province, including one on the St. Charles River west of downtown Quebec City.

But most of the flooding reports were concentrated in Quebec's Laurentian and Lanaudière regions, north of Montreal, which received 30 to 35 millimeters and 35 to 40 millimeters of rain, respectively, between Thursday and Saturday, Environment Canada meteorologist Felix Biron said.

The rural municipality of Chertsey, 45 kilometers north of St Jerome, said in a Facebook post on Saturday that torrential rain had washed out part of a local road, submerged two cars and forced about 50 residents from the rest of the town.

Provincial police spokeswoman Eva Brochu-Joubert said two passengers in one of the vehicles escaped unharmed. Authorities were initially unable to locate the driver of the second vehicle, but later located him safely.

Chertsey officials expect the damaged road to be repaired by Sunday morning.