University of B.C. anthropology museum flooded by burst water main

VANCOUVER – Staff at the University of British Columbia’s Museum of Anthropology are mopping up after a water main burst outside the building’s entrance.

UBC’s public affairs department says the museum’s entrance was flooded, but a water pipe has been shut off and water is being cleared from the lobby and entrance.

The department issued a series of updates on Twitter Wednesday afternoon, and concluded that the flood didn’t appear to cause visible damage to the museum’s collection, but staff will be doing a full assessment.

The Museum of Anthropology is located at UBC’s Point Grey campus in Vancouver, and houses over 500,000 archaeological objects, most from the northwest coast of British Columbia.

The museum is well-known for its large First Nations collection, and for the outdoor Haida houses and ten full-scale totem poles on its grounds.

The museum was founded in 1949 and the building was designed by Canadian architect Arthur Erickson.