PETERBOROUGH, Ont., (July 16, 2004) — Some local carriers got their trucks rolling again today despite the announcement by Peterborough officials to keep the flooded city under a state of emergency for at least one more day.

While the Ontario city of 74,000 people begins its recovery, officials estimate it might be at least a week or two before some residents and businesses get back to normal.

Thursday’s downpour dropped up to 190 millimetres of rain, leaving much of the city’s core underwater. The immense storm — the same weather system that pelted Edmonton with golf ball-sized hail last week — caused sewers to back up and the Otonabee River to overflow onto the city.

Most streets were washed and impassable at the height of the storm, with water almost one metre deep in some areas. Between 700 and 800 basements remain flooded and at least 500 households or businesses are still without electricity today, Canadian Press reports.

Bruce Dodds, claims manager for Peterborough-based Meyers Transport, says he got caught in the middle of the storm coming in to work early yesterday morning. “As I was heading to the south end, I saw that the Otonabee River and the creeks that feed it were all overflowing,” he told Today’s Trucking this morning.

Dodds said the terminal’s street was impassable and he was forced to park his car and hitch a ride in a neighbour’s pick-up truck the rest of the way. “When I got to the yard here it was totally flooded,” he says. “They actually barricaded our street off … All trucks were grounded.”

By the middle of the day the storm had calmed, and extra staff and mechanics were called in to get the trucks up and running — a handful of them rendered immobile as water levels submerged fuel tanks. “We had to check all the trailers, wheel seals, and hubs … The trucks were all towed away so they could be checked and the fuel checked before we fired them up again,” Dodds says, adding that while there’s a financial impact to the storm, it’s too early to affix a dollar figure.

“The reason we were able to minimize the impact so effectively is because of the staff we have. They really pulled together and came through,” Dodds says. “Today, everything is back out. It’s recovery day.”

— with files from Canadian Press