The Gilbert Plains Country Club was preparing for the biggest week of the season, but it turned into something a lot worse.
The Diamond Athletic Men’s Mid-Amateur Championship and Diamond Athletic Women’s Amateur Championship were postponed last week due to the flooding which occurred in the Parkland.
The two events were to be held at the GPCC, July 1 to 3, but were moved to other locations after the postponement.
GPCC general manager and head professional Scott McCallum called it the worst flooding the facility has ever seen.
“By a mile,” he added.
“I don’t think we’ve ever had our clubhouse compromised the way it was. It’s devastating, to be honest.”
McCallum went to the course Friday morning for the first time since the flooding started.
“We knew that golf carts were floating down the river, it’s obviously, quite a disaster to see,” he said.
The water has started to recede, but that is actually making matters worse.
“The problem is that the force of the water going back into the river is taking some things with it,” McCallum said, adding it is too early to tell if the facility will be able to open again this year.
“Until we can actually, physically get in there and assess the damage that we’re up against, it will be too early to tell. But, as you know, whether it’s a flood or not, the grass keeps growing. So we’re going to have to somehow maintain the beautiful golf course that we’ve got,” he said.
The grounds crew worked hard to prepare to showcase the course to the province during the two provincial tournaments, which is disheartening.
“But I know that we’ll get back on our feet. We’ve got a strong board that’s forward-minded thinking and we’ll definitely get back and be better for it in the future,” McCallum said.
McCallum is not worried about finding money to pay for the repairs that will be needed.
“The Province has been there from the start. They’ve made some good announcements that they’re going to be there for small businesses and not-for-profit businesses. I’m not really worried about that,” he said.
“We’ve got a great MLA in Dauphin. He’ll do everything in his power to make sure that his region is taken care of and I think Wab (Kinew, Manitoba Premier) feels the same way.”
At this point it’s just a matter of waiting for the water to recede.
McCallum appreciates the messages of support GPCC has received.
“All the messages of support, not only to our members, but how passionate people are about Gilbert Plains Country Club, that’s probably the motivation to keep you going,” he said.
The Dauphin Lake Golf Club was also hit with flooding, with most of the course being under water at one point, according to general manager and head professional Shawn Woods.
“Except for some areas. But it’s now subsided. But the lake is up, so who knows,” he said.
DLGC remains closed and conditions will be reassessed Wednesday morning after Sunday’s rainfall.
“It’s very wet. We’ve been pumping nonstop for four days and trying to clean things up. But the golf course and clubhouse has been closed, too. We had water in the clubhouse. So we’ve got lots to do,” Woods said.
Woods hopes to open Monday, but the clubhouse will likely remain closed indefinitely.
The driving range will also be closed and the tournaments scheduled for this weekend were cancelled, however, the pro shop will be open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday and Sunday.

They expected to play close to home when the 11U Tier 3 provincials were to hit the diamonds in Grandview this past weekend.
But the flooding last week resulted in the provincial tournament being moved to Portage and the 11U Dauphin Fusion Credit Union team made the best of it, coming home with a silver medal.
Dauphin opened the nine-team tournament with a 6-2 win over Grosse Isle, Friday, and followed that up with a 15-3 win over Tri-Community.
On Saturday, Dauphin dropped a 10-5 decision to Portage, but rebounded to beat Cartwright/Baldur, 14-4.
This placed Fusion in second place and into the semifinals, where a 4-3 victory over Neepawa put them in the final, where they faced Portage once again.
The host team clinched the provincial gold medal with a 12-2 triumph, going undefeated at 5-0.
Fusion coach Mike Winters noted two of their games ended early due to the mercy rule, where a game ends if a team is ahead by 10 runs after five innings.
“So we were able to save pitchers for the next game because of it,” he said.
Teams had to battle hot weather throughout the tournament.
Winters noted the temperature for Sunday’s semifinal was 34C with the humidex, while the final was about 38C.
Winters was impressed with how the players came together as a team throughout the tournament.
“Teamwork and sportsmanship was unbelievable. My coaches, who coached along side me were unbelievable. All around it was amazing. I’m very proud of my team,” he said, adding Barret Procyshyn was a co-coach.
Knowing Portage had a strong team, Fusion treated the semifinal against Neepawa as its championship game.
“We wanted to guarantee we got the silver medal. The gold medal would have been great for Dauphin and the Parkland, but we knew two games on Sunday was hard to win,” Winters said.
“Portage, they finished first in their round-robin, so they got a bye to the finals. They didn’t have to play in the morning, which was to their benefit. It’s just the way it is.”
Winters credited Portage for hosting the tournament at the last minute, noting they had just a couple of days to prepare for it.
“It’s unfortunate Grandview couldn’t do it. They did so much work, so much energy and time into it and they reached out to our team for us to bring everything out there for Portage,” he said.
“The parents were amazing in Grandview and volunteers. We had a lot of people here in Dauphin, too, who were amazing and helped our team out, donated stuff to us.”
Fusion Credit Union sponsored the team, while Canadian Tire donated some swag for the Grandview event and for the players, as well.
Fusion called up three players and a coach from Roblin and one player from Ste. Rose to join the team for provincials. Winters wishes to thank them for their efforts.
“They helped us a lot. It was great,” Winters said, adding it feels great to be a provincial silver medalist.
“I don’t even remember the last time Dauphin has had it. It’s been a while. And I’m very proud of them. It feels amazing. Beyond words.”

Last week’s flooding in the Parkland resulted in numerous washouts to roads and bridges within the region.
The bridge over the Wilson River on Hwy. 5 between Dauphin and Gilbert Plains was damaged in the flooding, but was quickly repaired thanks to Reit-Syd Equipment Ltd. of Dauphin and Stirling Aggregates.
Manitoba Infrastructure was quick to turn to Reit-Syd to get the repairs done, providing direction on how it may be done.
The east side of the highway connecting the bridge dropped because the floodwater compromised the bank. Crews from Reit-Syd and Stirling were able to re-open the highway by reshaping the bank and building the road back up.
Reit-Syd general manager Don Tarrant said they were called to Ste. Rose, June 30, at about 7 p.m.
“So we moved a couple of gravel trucks down there, because we were going to close that ring dike around the community,” he said.
“Then we got a second call about the bridge getting washed out on the east end. So we moved down there about 10 o’clock on June 30.”
That night, rock from Grandview was hauled in, because the end was washing out, undermining the end of the bridge.
“They got rock at 11 o’clock at night and they placed rock until 9:30 in the morning. So they got that filled full of rock as best they could and it pushed the water under the bridge where it would normally go,” Tarrant said.
Other equipment was moved in and work began again Thursday morning and continued until about 11 p.m.
“And what they did was, they jackhammered off the end of the bridge apron and below that was where it was eroded. And then they filled that void below, just pound it full of rock and just jackhammered and pounded that rock in there for a really good base,” Tarrant explained.
“And then they put geo cloth in on top of the rock and then put on top of that finished gravel up to road level. And then, of course, after that they had to remove all the trailhead they had excavated out, concrete and asphalt. So by 11:30 last night, that bridge was opened up.”
Two staff members initially began working on the project, June 30. Five staff worked on the site, Thursday.
The cost to repair the bridge has yet to be determined.
“Honestly, I think they just marked down their hours when they started and when they finish. Then Manitoba Infrastructure will audit those hours and then pay us accordingly,” Tarrant said.

The water came quickly, receded almost as fast, and left in its wake a path of destruction, which included a long list of provincial infrastructure, municipal assets and private property.
Across the Parkland people woke up on Canada Day to swollen rivers and creeks, overland flooding and flooded basements, courtesy of a storm cell, which dropped from 120 millimetres to more than 150 millimetres of rain across the region.
Dauphin city manager Sharla Griffiths said leading up to Canada Day, municipal officials began monitoring the situation Sunday night and into Monday before problems started arising Tuesday morning.
“Tuesday morning, I started getting calls from our utility guys saying, ‘Hey, things are all functioning, but we just can’t keep up, the lift station pumps can’t keep up, and there’s water in the streets.’ So we started monitoring,” Griffiths said, adding throughout the day, Tuesday, there was water at some intersections, but things were still manageable.
It was not until the early morning hours of Wednesday that the seriousness of the situation became evident, when the Vermillion River spilled over its banks between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.
“I saw the first email come through with some photos at 2 a.m. and it said things are happening in Dauphin,” Griffiths said, adding throughout the timeline officials were holding discussions about the situation and developing a plan of action.
All in all, Griffiths is pleased with the efforts of municipal staff in the face of unprecedented challenges presented by the flood.
“We had people boots on the ground checking things out, doing what we could and when the sun came up on the morning of the first we were inundated with water,” she said.
“Our staff, everybody rolled up their sleeves, pitched in, and did what they needed to do. Mayor and council have been super supportive and there right beside us.
“So the organization functioned as it should in this type of situation.”
Among the damage caused by that water was extensive flooding in the basement of Dauphin Regional Health Centre, which knocked out power and forced an evacuation of the facility, which saw 54 patients transferred to other hospitals across the province
In a virtual press conference Thursday, Prairie Mountain Health CEO Treena Slate said every effort to provide some level of care locally is being made, while the extent of the damage to the facility is determined and repairs are made.
“We are providing a triage clinic based out of Dauphin and we do have the mobile clinic set up. We’ve also set up a more, sort of, permanent structure within the Dauphin Regional Health Center community health services building, which is adjacent to the hospital, where patients can be quickly assessed if they’re not sure if their concern is emergent. They would be transported to the nearest appropriate emergency department from there, or treated for minor injuries and illnesses there,” Slate said, adding employees throughout the system have stepped up to ensure some continuity of care.
“The physicians from the Dauphin clinic are providing that service and they are also providing support to the Ste. Rose Emergency Department, as well.”
While people are already asking when the hospital will reopen, Slate said it is far to early to tell. The priority is to pump water from the basement, restore power and HVAC and then assess the damage.
“We are in conversations with our incident command structure provincially, already thinking about reopening. That’s definitely front of mind. We need to start planning accordingly,” Slate said, adding operations at both Dauphin personal care homes were uninterrupted by the flooding.
“Given the significance of the flooding and the challenges of pumping out the water, and in view of the ongoing flooding situation, it’s challenging to give a timeline at this time.
“We are having our insurer engage with a restoration company to assess the damage and we’ll have a better idea in the coming days of the timeline on that.”
As damages at the DRHC and across the region become more apparent, Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew, who was in town Thursday to assess the situation, wants life in the Parkland to get back to normal as quickly as possible.
To that end Kinew announced a $5 million cash advance program through disaster financial assistance to expedite repairs.
“The idea behind this $5 million is we know on the provincial side there’s a ton of roads and bridges that are going to need to be repaired. So the need at the municipal side is going to be there, as well,” Kinew said.
“We don’t want any resource or financial question to get in the way of getting people back to normal. So that’s why we want to work together collaboratively.”
In the city, while there is extensive damage to personal property, municipal assets seem to have weathered the storm quite well, mayor David Bosiak said.
“Our northeast end of town was most severely impacted, because it’s the lowest end of our community. So we still have some basement flooding in some areas and sewer backups (Thursday). But our reports this morning were that most of them have been cleaned out. It’s just a matter now of remediating and cleaning some seepage in a few areas of the community,” Bosiak said.
“Right now we basically believe that we have everything under our own control. We’ve asked for a very modest amount from the province as cash coverage, before we get into the disaster financial assistance stage of things, but I think we’re okay,”
It is a different story in the Rural Municipality of Dauphin. With more then 500 miles of roads, it will take some time to get a handle on the situation, reeve Ernie Sirski said.
Initial reports are that there are more than 200 wash outs, but Sirski expects that number to increase significantly.
“We don’t know the extent of damages yet. I mean, we’ve got people that are landlocked, people that cannot get out of their houses right now. So we have to make sure that, first of all, they’re safe. We’re doing whatever we can to make sure that people can get access, make sure that they’re safe,” Sirski said.
“We've been told that we can access $500,000 from the province as of today to help with fixing up our roads and we thank the province for their contribution.”
As repairs begin, Kinew added consideration will be given to the effects of climate change, which has increased the number and frequency of severe storms.
“Part of what we’re telling our municipal partners, we’re telling all Manitobans is that as we go into the disaster financial assistance stage, we want to build resilient infrastructure. So, it’s not just about building back the same thing that we had before. Now that we’ve seen what can happen with a changing climate, we need to build infrastructure that’s going to meet that need,” he said.
“We have got to be resilient as people. We also have to make sure that our infrastructure is resilient, too, and as we roll out this DFA program, we want the municipal partners to know that it’s not just about restoring what was there. It’s about building roads and culverts and other pieces of infrastructure, so that we can handle an event like this in the future. God forbid, but we’ve got to prepare.”
As the cleanup continues, people are encouraged to check municipal websites and social media for information about available resources,
When it comes to health care, updates can be found on the PMH website at prairiemountainhealth.ca, or across their social media platforms.
“We strongly encourage people to call 911 as they normally should in the event of any situation or if they’re not sure about their medical circumstance,” Slate said.
“We have physicians and nurses who can do a primary assessment and we would rely on our EMS partners to transfer patients to the nearest and most appropriate emergency department. based on the patient’s care needs.”
For non-urgent matters, Dauphin and area residents are encouraged to call Health Links toll-free at 1-888-315-9257.

The Swan Valley dealt with another historic flood last week – a flood that brought the Manitoba premier back for another visit, prompting a call for military support from the federal government, and an evacuation of multiple neighbourhoods in Swan River. Nearly all but one road into Saskatchewan down PR No. 275 to Preeceville was the only road access to the outside world that the Swan Valley had at one point, with all major highways suffering major collapses, including between Norquay and Pelly, south of Benito, near Mafeking, and at Pine River. Here is but a fraction of the devastation caused by the weather event.(TOP LEFT) A van sits helpless in its drowned parking spot at the edge of Legion Park.... 

Mother Nature unleashed wrath yet again on the Valley last week. After several inches of rain fell for the second time in three weeks, Valley residents were forced to head for higher ground...

On June 17, at approximately 3:30 a.m., RCMP responded to a report of an assault occurring at a residence on Augusta Street East, in Russell.
Officers learned that a 20-year-old female had attended a party at a nearby home when she was repeatedly punched and kicked by another female. Paramedics subsequently treated the female for her injuries.
RCMP went to the home where the party was still in progress and were greeted by a 29-year-old male who was known to police. After initially trying to shake an officer’s hand, the suspect punched the officer in the side of the head. The officer took the suspect to the ground and arrested him.
Officers then located the female suspect in the initial assault and took her into custody.
Maverick Oudie, 29, of Dauphin is charged with:
• Assaulting a police officer; and
• Resisting a peace officer.
Tanis Cooke, 25, of Waywayseecappo First Nation is charged with assault.
Both were released, with a future court appearance scheduled.

Read the whole RCMP Report in this week's Russell Banner on page 3.

Brian and Bernadine Brown are quite literally lucky to be alive. At about 7:30 pm on Sunday June 28th, Brian Brown headed into the century home he and he wife had been restoring for the last decade, after purchasing it in 2004.
Brian Brown told The Brandon Sun said he just come in from the shop in furious rain and hail when he noticed a tree falling and yelled at this wife to stay away from the windows and hit the floor. The tornado itself lasted about 10 seconds the 76 year old couple told The Sun. The damage done to their circa 1904 home was extensive, leaving debris throughout the home and pictures simply disappearing off the walls.
Shirley Kalyniak, the mayor of Rossburn described the Brown’s farmyard as ‘war zone’ adding that forest of trees that were more than a 100 years old had been snapped liked twigs with the Browns belongings strewn all over the yard Their neighbors home, about 300 yards away had their detached garage and shed destroyed along with damage to the roof of their home.

With files from CBC and The Brandon Sun

To get the whole story, pick-up this week's Russell Banner and turn to page 2.

Thunderstorms brought close to 140 mms of rain to the area June 28, 29 and 30 leaving flooded basements, sewer back-ups and washed-out roads in its wake. Coupled with an already high water table and super-saturated soil pretty much everywhere made things much worse than the recent flooding of the Boggy and the Shell River.
Overland flooding caused a massive landslide near Deepdale which took out the CN’s trestle bridge.
Check out the photos in this week’s paper.

Due to rapidly rising water levels along rivers and deteriorating conditions throughout the municipality, residents are strongly advised not to travel on any municipal roads unless absolutely necessary. Conditions are changing quickly, and many roads may be unsafe or impassable. Please be aware that not all road closures and hazards have been barricaded, as some affected locations cannot be safely accessed by crews at this time.
Traveling on municipal roads may place you at significant risk. Water can conceal washouts, road damage, and other dangerous conditions. Residents are urged to remain in a safe location and avoid unnecessary movement until conditions improve.
Public Works crews continue to monitor the situation around the clock and are responding to emergencies and reports as they are received. However, ongoing flooding and inaccessible areas may delay response times.
If you choose to voluntarily evacuate for your safety, please contact the Municipality at 204-638-4531 to register your evacuation location and contact information. In an emergency, call 911 immediately. For municipal emergency concerns related to flooding or infrastructure, contact the RM of Dauphin Emergency Line at 204-701-8523.
Residents are strongly encouraged to monitor local radio stations, media outlets, the RM website, and the RM of Dauphin Facebook page for updates. Conditions remain serious and may worsen with little notice.