{"id":335695,"date":"2025-12-10T00:44:36","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T00:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/335695\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T00:44:36","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T00:44:36","slug":"severe-august-storms-caused-235-million-in-damage-across-the-prairies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/335695\/","title":{"rendered":"Severe August storms caused $235 million in damage across the Prairies"},"content":{"rendered":"

A line of severe storms that hammered Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba in late August caused more than $235 million in insured damages, according to the Insurance Bureau of Canada.<\/a><\/p>\n

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The storms, which swept across the three provinces on Aug. 20 and 21, included golf ball-sized hail, torrential rains, strong winds and several confirmed reports of tornadoes<\/a> touching down in both Alberta and Saskatchewan.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe storms that swept across the prairies on Aug. 20 and 21 also included several confirmed reports of funnel clouds touching down.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy: Gerry Pocha, Radisson, Sk\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The hardest-hit communities included Brooks, Alta.<\/a>, Radisson, Langham and North Battleford, Sask.<\/a> and Portage la Prairie, Man<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Following the storm, Environment Canada Meteorologist Crawford told Global News that in North Battleford, Sk, wind gusts were clocked at 129 km\/h.<\/p>\n

Trees were blown down, windows and siding were smashed, at least one barn roof was ripped off, power lines were toppled and many crops were destroyed.<\/p>\n

Near Brooks, a pony and a camel were also killed when they tried to take shelter from the storm beneath some trees.<\/p>\n

The IBC estimates that damage to vehicles accounted for about a third of the insured costs.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe line of storms included winds near 130 km\/hr in some places along with torrential rain and hail the size of golf balls.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy: Tracey Verishine, Langham, Sk\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cMany people in the path of this devastating storm had their lives disrupted and property damaged,\u201d said Aaron Sutherland, vice-president Pacific and Western, Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC).<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t0:30
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMassive storm snaps power lines, damages homes and cars in southern Alberta\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Amy Bueckert of Neualage, Sask., whose house was severely damaged by golf ball-sized hail, described the storm as \u201cinsane.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cIt was very, very loud, it was like someone was chucking rocks all over the house.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tThe storm also many crops, like this one in the Brooks, Ab area.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tGlobal News\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

IBC says the total damage from the summer weather season across Western Canada, including damage from both wildfires and hailstorms, caused an estimated $725 million in insurance damage.<\/p>\n

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Get the day’s top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day.<\/p>\n

The estimate includes a hailstorm in Calgary on July 13 that caused $164 million in damage and the La Ronge, Flin Flon, Lac du Bonnet and Shoe wildfires in Saskatchewan and Manitoba that resulted in about $360 million in insured losses.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe Insurance Bureau of Canada says the \u201ceventful weather\u201d during the summer of 2025, caused more than $725 million in insured damage across western Canada, including $360 million in losses from wildfires in Saskatchewan and Manitoba.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy: Joanne Dorward\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The IBC\u2019s damage estimates also include a plea for governments to take steps to better protect Canadians from future natural disasters<\/a>, including more stringent building codes, mandating the use of hail-resistant roofing and siding for all new construction in high-risk areas, improved hailstorm notification systems, providing homeowners with incentives to make their homes and businesses more resilient and improved wildfire preparedness.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2:05
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSummer storms leave a trail of destruction in central Saskatchewan\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A line of severe storms that hammered Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba in late August caused more than $235…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335696,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,46,295,1132,41399,66,147497,1133],"class_list":["post-335695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-economy","tag-environment","tag-fire","tag-insurance-bureau-of-canada","tag-science","tag-storm-damage","tag-weather"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335695\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}