Adjusters preparing for flood Cat after Ontario’s spring thaw

With more rain — and snow — forecast for Ontario this weekend, adjusters are closely monitoring the potential for catastrophic flooding in the province.

“Right now, it’s more of a monitor-and-prepare situation, not a full Cat event just yet. That could change though,” Christine Segaric, director of Cat response at ClaimsPro, tells Canadian Underwriter Friday.

“At this point, we’re watching the northern and northeastern Ontario communities, places like Sudbury and Timmins. We are also paying attention to some of the more remote and lower lying communities like Kapuskasing.

“It still feels a bit early though. We’re not seeing a big spike in claims yet. But based on what’s happening on the ground, I wouldn’t be surprised to see things ramp up quickly over the next week or two as temperatures keep rising and the snowpack starts to melt.”

Parts of northern Ontario received more than 500 cm of snow this winter, The Weather Network reports. And the warm, spring-like temperatures over the past week have led to a rapid thaw, causing several waterways to flood. The Weather Network forecasts more rain in southern Ontario Saturday, and a mix of rain and snow in northern Ontario.

“The freeze-thaw cycle is a big part of it,” Segaric says of reports of serious flooding in several areas of the province. “We came out of a pretty deep freeze earlier this year, and now we’re shifting into warmer weather. That swing tends to create ice buildup, and with frozen grounds it makes it hard for water to drain properly once everything starts melting.”

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That concern is exactly what Jim Mandeville, senior vice president at First Onsite and disaster recovery specialist, sees play out every spring on the ground.

“If we talk about Southern Ontario, we don’t have consistent very cold temperatures like we do in the West,” Mandeville told CU in mid-February. “So, when we go from hovering around freezing to minus 30, and back and forth, we end up with ice damming like crazy. If you talk about the total volume of [winter-related] claims, especially from an underwriting perspective, it’s ice damming [among the most].”

This week, Segaric says, “losses are a mix of flooding and snow-load related collapses.”

Insurance Bureau of Canada reports “we’re already seeing significant flooding in a number of communities, with many more facing elevated risk,” according to Amanda Dean, vice president of Ontario and Atlantic.

Drone footage shows several roadways in North Bay are washed out. Minden Hills, Ont., a small town in Haliburton County, has closed down roads and declared a state of emergency in response to flood conditions in the community, The Weather Network reports. And Central Manitoulin Island declared a state of emergency earlier in the week following major floods in multiple communities that shut down the Manitoulin Hospital.

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“For residents impacted by flooding, IBC’s Consumer Information Centre has activated its Virtual Community Assistance Mobile Pavilion (V-CAMP) program to support home, car and business owners across the region,” says Dean.

Adjusters note that when floodwaters start rising, there is only so much homeowners can do. However, suggestions include:

• making sure sump pumps are working (and ideally have a backup)
• re-grading driveways to prevent water from pooling near the house
• clearing eavestroughs and downspouts
• ensuring downspouts direct water away from the house
• clearing snow around the home’s foundation.

David Gambrill

David has twice served as Canadian Underwriter’s senior editor, both from 2005 to 2012, and again from 2017 to the present.