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Photo: Commonwealth Stadium flooded during Edmonton storm

Photo: Commonwealth Stadium flooded during Edmonton storm

It's probably a good thing that the Edmonton Eskimos were on the road this week. While they pulled off a 20-16 win in nice weather conditions in Winnipeg Thursday night, the severe thunderstorm that hit Edmonton Friday has made a significant impact on their typical playing surface, The Brick Field at Commonwealth Stadium. Here's a photo Eskimos' president Len Rhodes tweeted of the field Friday:

The Eskimos don't have a home game until Saturday, July 23 against Hamilton, so there should be plenty of time to sort this out, and there haven't been too many reports of flooding causing major damage at Commonwealth recently (unlike what we saw in Winnipeg in 2014), so this isn't necessarily a big concern for the CFL right now. There have been plenty of unusual weather games in this league before, though, from rain to snow to fog and ice, and we may get more as the year rolls on.

Still, it's fortunate that the CFL isn't trying to play a game in Edmonton Friday. The day's only game, between the Tiger-Cats and Alouettes, takes place in Montreal, which had a much balmier 28-degree temperature Friday afternoon. Meanwhile, grounds crews in Edmonton will likely have their work cut out for them after this storm, but there's at least a good turnaround time. (This Edmonton storm is also a little more effective than the performance the Edmonton Storm WWCFL team turned in in that league's final in June, a 81-6 loss to the Saskatoon Valkyries.)

This is part of a series of storms that have rocked Edmonton over the last few weeks, but hopefully the weather will be a little better next Saturday when the Eskimos face the Tiger-Cats. After all, that game will feature a halftime concert from Florida-based rapper Flo Rida. Maybe he'll bring some sun with him.