Chilcotin River

Plans to help migrating salmon make it up British Columbia's Chilcotin River to spawning grounds are in the works after a massive landslide breach created barrier challenges, but officials will wait to see if the water carves a new route for the fish, says Nathan Cullen, the provincial water, land and resource stewardship minister.

High waters that flowed over top of a massive landslide in British Columbia's Chilcotin River are churning in the Fraser River towards British Columbia's Lower Mainland today.

Connie Chapman with the province's water management branch says the pulse of water after the dam breached yesterday morning will make its way toward the Fraser River, and modelling shows it will reach the community of Hope sometime today.

The B.C. government says it's "extremely unsafe" to be near the banks of the Chilcotin and Fraser rivers both upstream and downstream from a massive landslide after water started flowing through the slide early Monday.

Officials have said the water collecting behind the slide south of the city of Williams Lake could reach a level where it will start flowing over the debris, or it will erode the material, setting off a release.

An expert on British Columbia's salmon populations says the massive landslide that blocked off part of Canada's largest sockeye salmon run has created an unprecedented situation potentially putting the already struggling fish at even more risk.

A government statement says the landslide Wednesday blocked the river that feeds into the Fraser River, and a sudden release of water "may cause rapid rises in river levels downstream along the Fraser River" south to Hope, B.C.