Not even a closure of the Coquihalla Highway can stop the Road to Victory Tour! ---
A wave of storms in B.C. has led transportation officials to close down half of the Coquihalla Highway indefinitely because of an avalanche risk.
CTV.ca News Staff
Over the past few days, the province has been hit by one storm after another. Some parts of the B.C. interior have recently received as much as two metres of snow. The snowfall, combined with warming temperatures and high winds, has avalanche forecasters worried.
Those worries have led the province's Ministry of Transportation to close down the southern section of the Coquihalla between the towns of Hope and Merritt. The toll highway is part of the most direct route from Vancouver into the province's interior.
"This is very, very unusual. I honestly cannot remember where we had a closure for that reason (threat of avalanches) for a few days," Jeff Knight, a spokesperson for B.C.'s transportation ministry told CTV.ca.
A small avalanche at the Great Bear snow shed near Merritt -- about 270 kilometres northeast from Vancouver -- shut down the highway on Thursday morning. The closure came after snow buried a 55-metre-wide section of the highway. One car was briefly caught in the slide, but no one was injured and there was no major damage to the car.
Although that section of the highway has since been cleared, transportation officials are taking no chances, fearing there could be more avalanches.
Avalanche technicians have now been flown in and there are plans to employ a technique called heli-bombing to negate the avalanche risk. The technicians are hoping to create tiny explosions to bring down snow that presents a risk to the highway and drivers.
But technicians have been hindered by bad weather, including a major dump of snow on Friday. Knight said until the weather clears up, half of the highway will remain closed.
During the closure, drivers who would normally use the Coquihalla are being asked to take Highway 3/5a or Highway 1.
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