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© Drew Gragg, The Ottawa CitizenWater flowing from the Gatineau River (top) into the Ottawa River (foreground) appears muddier after the heavy rains Friday.
Ottawa - Residents of Gatineau and the surrounding regions were struggling to cope Saturday after heavy rainfall and severe thunderstorms washed out stretches of highway and reportedly resulted in the evacuation of hundreds of homes.

At 4:26 p.m. Friday, Environment Canada's weather watchers issued a severe thunderstorm warning for Ottawa, Pontiac and Upper Gatineau. About 100 millimetres of rain fell over the next several hours. Authorities reported that numerous streets, many of them residential, flooded in Aylmer, Gatineau and Hull.

The Gatineau region appears to have been hardest hit by the storm. Highway 148 in Pontiac was closed in and around Eardley and Masham, with some of the four lanes on the highway near Luskville washed away. Notch Road in Chelsea was also reportedly washed out.

"It's affecting a lot of people," Tami Ladouceur, who works at a grocery store in Pontiac, said Friday on learning of the Highway 148 closures. "People aren't able to go home."

She said traffic in the area was being rerouted.

The last two days have been turbulent in terms of weather in the region. According to Environment Canada, as much as 40 millimetres of rain fell on the Ottawa and Gatineau area Thursday, although that seemed to vary as one area would be deluged while another was missed.

Elsewhere, officials at the Macdonald-Cartier International Airport said more than two dozen flights, arriving and departing, were delayed or cancelled on Friday.

Environment Canada forecast more showers throughout Saturday and there was a risk of another thunderstorm during the afternoon.