City flooded with calls after overnight deluge

The city was flooded with calls — about flooding — after an overnight thunderstorm which swamped the Don Valley Parkway, an entrance to the Yonge-Bloor subway and basements across Toronto.

Around 3 a.m. Wednesday, between 50 and 60 millimetres of rain fell in the span of an hour, just short of Environment Canada’s upper limit of 70 millimetres.

“It was a significant amount of water,” public works committee chair Denzil Minnan-Wong told reporters at city hall on Wednesday afternoon.

“We are keeping a watch on any potential additional rain events, which could cause us some concern because our system is right now at capacity.”

Minnan-Wong said “micro-bursts” — a lot of rain in a short period of time — are something the city can’t control and such events usually happen every two years.

There are ways, however, to prevent basement flooding. Click here for more information.

And here’s what to do if your basement floods:

• Report it to the city by calling 311
• Report property damage to your insurance provider as soon as possible
• Take photos of the damage to support the insurance claim
• Keep receipts from emergency repair work or cleanups
• File a claim if you think someone was hurt or property was damaged because the city didn’t properly maintain its facilities (i.e. roads and sewers). Click here for more information.