Our friend Jay's city has been getting hit hard by flooding the last couple of days. I think Jay is in a safe area so I hope Calgary recovers quickly from this unusual weather disaster.

http://globalnews.ca/edmonton/

Is it an unusual weather pattern that has brought so much moisture to the area?

I've been watching for the last couple of days and the amount of flooding in some areas is unbelievable.

Yes, it has been an unusual weather pattern, a low sitting below us bringing warm moist air up and pushing it against the mountains creating a lot of rain, something like 175mm of rain Thursday which created some extreme run off through the mountains washing out the trans-Canada highway at Canmore and Banff. The river systems just couldn't hold the water, Highriver had some pretty bad flooding which came up very quickly as well as Bragg Creek.

Calgary evacuated about 500m - 1 km on either side of the 2 rivers through Calgary, about 100,000 people and it looks like it was a good thing too.

http://globalnews.ca/calgary/

Thanks Jason. I was watching some of the radar sequences last and the airflow seemed to me to be going the wrong way.

In all the time I spent in the Banff area, I do not recall anything close to the water levels you are seeing now. I can't imagine how many houses will be a total write off. I feel bad for those affected.

To the best of my knowledge this has never happened before, at least nothing in the record books.

Haven't been on this board in a few days but I've been thinking about you Jason. Glad to see you posting.

Things are just starting to open up road wise in the city, but downtown is still without power for a few buildings and the downtown communities have none. High River is still dealing with high water levels in the community. There are many bridges washed out on virtually every highway to and from the communities south of us and west of us. Banff is still just emergency vehicles in/out along the #1 highway; hopes are high for the road to be open sometime this weekend.

The Stampede is slated to start this Friday, they have adopted a new slogan - Hell or High Water, they even have T-shirts available and proceeds go to charities around here.

The amount of support/volunteers coming out of the woodwork is phenomenal, there are people here from every corner of Alberta helping out.

We're now getting more people returning to work in the downtown core this morning, as most of those who didn't lose their homes are getting back to normal.

I live in the NE and work in the SE, so besides having to drive to work since the C-Trains into the south are not running, my wife and I escaped the waters. She works for the city in waste and recycling and has been posted at one of the evacuation centers and also assisting at some of the recycling depots.

It's really amazing how many of us take Mother Nature for granted...myself included.

Glad to see that you're safe, guys!