Chilcotin River Landslide on Aug. 9, 2024 (Image credit: B.C. government).

By Aaron Schulze

Chilcotin River Landslide Impacts

Chilcotin River landslide aftermath still impacting salmon migration, creating future risks

Aug 20, 2025 | 11:26 AM

WILLIAMS LAKE, B.C. — The Tŝilhqot’in National Government (TNG) is warning that the most serious impacts on salmon and the local river system may still be on the horizon.

A landslide on July 30, 2024, blocked the Tŝilhqox (Chilcotin River) during the key migration period for sockeye and Chinook salmon, creating an 11-kilometre lake upstream of the dam and triggering an extreme breakout flood that altered the migratory pathway to all its salmon spawning grounds. TNG says the Chilko sockeye run faced a 50 per cent mortality loss from the ocean return to spawning grounds and many other salmon were physically damaged when they returned.

In a news release issued Wednesday (Aug. 20), TNG says the landslide reshaped the course of the river, unloaded matter in the water system and destabilized slopes. Along with ongoing high turbidity levels affecting the 2025 salmon migration, the First Nation says the conditions create a high risk of further landslides in the coming years.

TNG notes a high-risk tension crack appeared on the slope above Nagwentled (Farwell Canyon) following the breakout flood. It says there is a high risk that it will fail in the short term and create a rockslide into the river that has the potential to block the salmon migration past Farwell Canyon, similar to the Big Bar landslide on the Fraser River in 2019.

“The rockfall risk at Nagwentled is a threat to our salmon, our safety and our way of life,” said Nits’ilʔin (Chief) Francis Laceese, vice-chief of TNG. “This is a traditional fishing site in the Tl’esqox caretaker area and it has sustained our people for generations – it’s vital to our food security, food sovereignty and culture. Protecting this fishery is a matter of our human rights and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The danger is real, and we cannot wait to see what happens-we must act now before it’s too late.”

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The Emergency Salmon Task Force is a group comprised of TNG, B.C. and Fisheries and Ocean Canada technical representatives. TNG says it has continued to meet regularly since the 2024 landslide to assess and address in-season risks to salmon returning in 2025 and create options to reduce or remove future risks of landslides and rockfall.