Canada’s Minister of Emergency Management and Community Resilience has approved emergency assistance for Manitobans in the wake of damaging floods.

Emergency assistance measures include deploying a small team of Canadian Armed Forces members to provide planning, assessment and coordination support for the ongoing flood response, mobilizing Team Rubicon Canada, a veteran-led disaster response organization, to assist with flood response and early recovery work, maintaining assistance from federally funded Humanitarian Workforce Program partners, and assisting provincial officials in the Manitoba Emergency Coordination Centre with coordination, as well as finding and sourcing equipment such as pumps and recovery kits to help expedite recovery.

Brandon, Manitoba recently declared a state of emergency after provincial forecasts suggested water levels in the local river basins will peak this week at levels near those seen during historic flooding in 2014. However, more than 30 communities in the Parkland region have already declared states of emergency, and up to 50 roads have been damaged by water. Parts of the town of Swan River are under a mandatory evacuation order. Asessippi Ski Resort has also been flooded out.