Hailstorm floods streets, basements in Swift Current, Sask.
Swift Current is cleaning up after rain and hail hammered the southwest Saskatchewan city, flooding streets and damaging crops in the surrounding area.
It's one of several severe weather events across the province over the weekend. The Northern Tornadoes Project is investigating reports that a tornado touched down in the Battlefords area on Friday.
Saskatchewan is in the middle of storm season, Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) meteorologist Terri Lang said in an interview.
"We have so much moisture sitting around in the fields from the rains that we've had. Plus the crops are growing and they give off a tremendous amount of moisture as well into the atmosphere, and we've got the heat going," Lang said.
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Swift Current received 26.4 millimetres of precipitation on Sunday and saw winds gusting up to 120 kilometres per hour, Lang said.
The evening storm flooded residential streets and basements. An RCMP vehicle appeared stranded on one flooded street and needed a tow truck to get out.
The hail wasn't large, but the amount overwhelmed drainage systems, Lang said.
"There were some reports of marble-size — maybe toonie-size — but most of it was smaller than that," Lang said.
"It was shredding a lot of the leaves on the trees. So when you have a whole bunch of hail and a whole bunch of leaves and a whole bunch of rain coming down at the same time, a lot of the drains were blocked from all that debris and ice."
A residential street in Swift Current, Sask., is flooded after a hail storm overwhelmed drainage systems on July 6. (Shawn Mullin/CBC)
At least a dozen communities across west-central Saskatchewan were under tornado warnings over the weekend, including Aquadeo, a resort village on Jackfish Lake about 40 kilometres north of the Battlefords.
Around 100 residents there took shelter in the community hall basement on Saturday and Sunday.
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While Friday's tornado isn't confirmed, the Northern Tornadoes Project has confirmed two tornadoes touched down on June 28 near Badgerville, which is about 370 kilometres east of Saskatoon. Both caused some damage, but no injuries were reported, according to the project's website.
Lang said the weather will calm down for the next couple of days, but another storm system could arrive by mid-week. She reminded people to have a severe weather emergency plan in place before a storm hits.
This article, written by Jeremy Warren, was originally published for CBC News on July 6, 2026.
Thumbnail image credit to Shawn Mullin/CBC News.