An online fundraising page has identified the victim of last week’s flash floods in western Nova Scotia as 13-year-old Eli Young.
Sarah Furey, a close friend of Eli’s family who is operating the GoFundMe page, says the people who were close to him are in shock at his sudden death.
Eli was swept into a ditch on Thursday in a Wolfville park during flash flooding that caused extensive damage across western Nova Scotia.
Furey says two weeks before his death Eli finished Grade 7 at a school in Wolfville, where he played point guard on the boys basketball team.
She says Eli was fiercely loyal and protective of his three sisters and younger brother, and considered his mom to be the smartest person he knew.
The online fundraiser has so far raised more than $43,000.
Minister blames municipalities for emergency alert delay
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The Nova Scotia government is criticizing municipalities for their decision not to request an emergency alert during the flooding last week.
In a letter to mayors and warden sent today, John Lohr, minister of municipal affairs, said that normally an alert must come from the municipalities because they are “best positioned” to prepare how messages are worded.
However, Lohr says that as more than 100 millimetres of rain fell in a few hours on the western and central regions on July 11, the province had to take the “extremely unusual step” of issuing an alert on its own at 8:30 p.m.
That was three hours after reports describing submerged, impassable roads and people having to flee their homes were coming in from first responders, and one hour after RCMP received a call about a youth disappearing in a drainage ditch in Wolfville, N.S.
Lohr says in his letter to the municipalities that as the province works on legislation to modernize the emergency alert system, he’s expecting municipalities “to be more vigilant in issuing alerts.”
Recordings of radio calls made Thursday evening by the fire department of Kings County, which includes Wolfville, indicate that residents were already calling in about extreme flooding around 5:30 p.m., describing rescues around the region.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 16, 2024.
© 2024 The Canadian Press
