(A friendly note – please enjoy all of our blogger’s contributions on the 2013 Alberta Floods that can found HERE)
This is Calgary! Thousands of people ready to help their neighbours at first of many volunteer deployments! pic.twitter.com/8bhLRtIC5m
— Naheed Nenshi (@nenshi) June 24, 2013
It started with a flood, and it will end with a flood.
The surging water was able to lash out a flood of physical damage; this disaster has been declared by Premier Redford as the largest flood to ever happen in Alberta. In contrast, it hasn’t washed out the resilience of Albertans; in fact, it is far from doing so. Let this perhaps be one of the strongest displays of solidarity and perseverance. This tweet perfectly alludes to our situation:
Even in a bad situation, there's always a positive side. Even if you can't see it yet.
— Oliver & Apricot (@olivernapricot) June 25, 2013
This month’s article in my awareness events series will be different from previous ones; intuition provoked our awareness that the flood victims require assistance in multiple aspects. Our information gateway in the form of social media did the rest. Let’s outline some of those social media trends that has done wonders in promoting this awareness and activating goodwill all around.
#yycflood (#yycfloods), #abflood (#abfloods), #medhat (#mhflood), and #highriver on Twitter – Being constantly updated with fresh content, these hashtags have been utilized heavily by both official sources and local citizens. @cityofcalgary, @CalgaryPolice, and @AB_EmergAlert, and @nenshi himself are just some of the notable government sources that are conveying essential information about developments. In turn, our media and citizens (there are just way too many active figures to count) are using this hashtag to document this flood in their neck of the woods and to retweet information to their followers.
Being the broadest, most representative of the Twitterverse’s response to this disaster, #ABFlood in particular is currently a Calgary trend on Twitter!
#yychelps and #yycfloodhero on Twitter – These hashtags are dedicated specifically to bring awareness of the need for all kinds of assistance and to express gratitude to those who provide them. Countless organizations including @UnitedWayCgy, @calgarydropin, @RedCrossAB, and @tascalgary are working on their front to fulfill their mission and update everyone on the help they require. @660News in particular is advocating for the use of #yycfloodheros to recognize all those dedicated Calgarians that impact all corners of Calgary.
#yycgreedy – Beware of price gouging! This hashtag aims to document alleged incidents of such illegal price hikes. Read this Metro News article that outlines some of the viral incidents.
@YYCFlood and @yychelps – These two are important aggregator acccounts on Twitter regarding the flood. YYCFlood serves to retweet all kinds of news pertaining to the floods while yychelps is sharing info on where to volunteer on rebuilding Southern Alberta. The latter has their own website with valuable links.
Hashtags on Facebook – New to the implementation of hashtags, the Facebook community has also utilized all of these hashtags. Click away – #yycflood (#yycfloods), #abflood (#abfloods), #medhat (#mhflood), #highriver, #yychelps, #yycfloodhero, #yycgreedy. Do note though that you can only search for those hashtags if you have a Facebook account and are logged in to it.
Calgary Clean Up – This popular pick is one of the Facebook community pages set up for aggregating updates on our flood situation. This initiative is run by YYChelps.ca and as you can see, it has already garned 28,063 likes as of Sunday night.
Calgary Flood – This is one of the other Facebook pages that documents the floods with some interesting flood photos from everyday citizens being shared by them. Oh, who can forget this?
Siksika First Nation’s Flood Info – Siksika First Nations has been severely hit by this flood; they have also created a facebook page for news related to their rebuilding efforts.
Google Crisis Map – The Google Crisis Response has uploaded a map with pinpoints for warnings and evacuation zones across Southern Alberta.
Interactive Google Map – Global News created a map that displays shelter listings from other helpful Calgarians. This map is a public collaboration and you can add to the list.
Photo-crazy Pinterest and Flickr – On Pinterest, #YYCFlood is flooded with all sorts of damage photos; the City of Calgary has also created a Calgary Flood Flickr group.
We have a large group of youth volunteers eager to take on a project this Sunday. Could use some #yycflood help? Please DM us! #youth #yyc
— Youth Central (@YouthCentralYYC) June 25, 2013
We YVC volunteers want to lend a hand too – If you are an organization looking for help for the clean-up efforts and would like some of us youth to assist you, please DM @YouthCentralYYC!
Please don’t hesitate to inform me of any social media sources I may have missed or correct me on anything by dropping me a comment or tweeting me through @WentaoHello. I welcome any links that you give me to help our readers get informed. The flood of information is priceless in this challenge.
Thank you to all of those who are maintaining these social media links! You can read the previous articles on my series here and I strongly urge you to read our other bloggers’ 2013 Flood posts through this tag!
Thank you Calgarians, Media, City staff, City partners for resiliency & tremendously large hearts. #yyc #yycflood
— City of Calgary (@cityofcalgary) June 22, 2013