Canada Post says delivery of Southern Interior letters and parcels could be a day or two late after a semi-trailer carrying mail crashed into the Coquihalla River near Hope.
The incident prompted the president of CUPW Local 758, which represents Canada Post employees in the city, to remind his employer that moving letter sorting from the Interior to Vancouver was a bad idea.
"We've got people who would love to sort that mail locally," Bob Mitchell said Thursday.
"Frankly, we warned Canada Post that transporting mail to Vancouver every day would put the mail at risk of delay due to weather and road conditions."
Thousands of letters and packages are affected, and Canada Post confirms the items will be delivered at least a day late, after the semi-trailer carrying the mail crashed about 150 kilometres east of Vancouver.
The cab of the truck was pulled free of the wreckage soon after the Monday crash, but the 12-metre-long trailer, packed with mail, remained upside-down until Wednesday, teetering on the banks of the Coquihalla River.
Operators of heavy-duty tow-trucks needed to recover the big trailer refused to pull the rig up the bank until they were sure Canada Post or its mail-hauling contractor would pay them.
Mitchell said snow storms have caused a couple of delays in mail delivery so far this winter. Plus there have been cases when mail that's supposed to be sorted in Vancouver comes back unsorted.
"That means (the mail) is making a round trip for nothing," he said, adding in those situations staff in Kamloops sort the mail.
There have been two mail runs a day between Kamloops and Vancouver since the sorting operation moved late last year.
As for the accident, Canada Post claims no water got into the container carrying the mail, but Mitchell has heard otherwise.
He's also been told some of the mail escaped the trailer and floated downstream.
There's no trick to drying out damp letters and parcels, he said. Letters are hung up to dry or dried with hair driers.
- Kamloops Daily News