No Canada Day celebration for Schroeder Creek Resort as floods shut down operation
By Nelson Daily Staff
By Suzy Hamilton, The Nelson Daily
Finding 100 loads of fill to repair the damage caused by Schroeder Creek is not easy.
Just ask Randy Phipps, manager of the Schroeder Creek RV and camping resort 15 km north of Kaslo.
“It’s not good,” said Phipps. “I haven’t been able to find fill. We can’t open until we get this fixed. We had to cancel everyone for the long weekend.”
The 68-site resort was completely flooded when Schroeder Creek’s culverts got blocked with debris brought down by the heavy rains on June 19.
The rogue creek cut a gully through the campground and dropped a $200,000 seasonal RV into the 12-foot gorge at the campsite.
“We were lucky, we got the RV out without damage,” said Phipps.
But lucky does not cover insurance to restore the campground.
“There is no coverage,” he said.
Phipps is suspicious of the logging activity in the watershed as the cause of the damage.
He says the debris in the creek left from an avalanche was dislodged with the rain.
“It was in 2011 that we were informed that the creek was full of logs eight kilometers up the creek, after an avalanche occurred below the logging, and it finally came down.
In fact, the Schroeder Creek logging road was the subject of a complaint to the Forest Practices Board in December 2003 by the Valhalla Wilderness Society (VWS).
The VWS asked the Board to investigate the six landslides that had occurred along the road and challenged that a terrain assessment had not been adequately performed.
Schroeder Creek is a domestic watershed with two licensed water users. Kokanee and bull trout spawn in the creek near its outlet into Kootenay Lake according to the Board’s report.
The Board investigated two of the landslides.
It concluded that “the terrain stability field assessment was not adequate for the challenging terrain conditions of the Schroeder Creek watershed because it did not provide all of the information recommended by the guidebook, nor an explanation for why it did not include all of the recommended information.”
The board also found that the licensee, Kalesnikoff Lumber, did not comply with the Forest Practices Code, in effect at the time.
“The licensee should have reasonably known that the observable water flowing from the spring prior to landslide 1 was likely to create conditions that could result in road building causing a landslide. By not investigating the water flow in greater detail after it was discovered, the licensee did not comply with section 45(3) of the Act.”
Meanwhile, excavators have been working to restore the campground.
“It looked so beautiful,” mused campground employee Lee Brown.
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