‘Just Another Kick in the Teeth’: Fort McMurray Residents Still Cleaning Up After Devastating Floods

Charity groups pitching in to help salvage flood-damaged homes

The Keyano College campus in downtown Fort McMurray on April 28, 2020, after a massive ice jam caused flooding and forced about 13,000 people out of their homes. The Canadian Press/Greg Halinda

Paul Rothwell’s plumbing shop in Fort McMurray’s Lower Townsite was one of hundreds of businesses and homes deluged after the spring thaw turned ice jams on the Athabasca and Clearwater rivers into a giant bowl of expanding water.

“I’ve made millions in Fort McMurray and I’ve lost millions in Fort McMurray, but it’s home,” said Rothwell, whose 25-year plumbing business sat in three feet of water at the height of the flooding.