A "spontaneous monsoon" damaged a few dozen books at the Prince George Public Library on Wednesday afternoon, but fast-acting staff were able to save many more.
A coolant tower drain froze and then backed up, sending a torrent of water onto some of the books upstairs.
"It created what I can only describe as a spontaneous monsoon over some of the upstairs stacks of books and in one other area by our elevator," library spokeswoman Andrea Palmer said.
She said the damage could have been much worse and credited the staff's quick response for saving the majority of the books in the affected areas.
"Members of staff quickly ran, gathering every garbage can and recycling bin in the building and collected as much water as possible," she said. "They immediately began obtaining book trollies from all over the library, stacking them high from books from that section and we were able to save I would say 99 per cent of the books . . . most of the books in that particular section are going to do just fine."
The books that were damaged, likely beyond repair, came from the travel section.
"We may have some books we're going have to re-order regarding people's next trip to Italy or France," Palmer said.
She joked on the library's Twitter feed that it's become the city's most "hydrophilic" institution as it's the second time in a few weeks there has been an unexpected water release at the facility. In November, some baby programming had to be moved due to a different leak in a maintenance room.
The library believes the two leaks are unrelated and Palmer said there are no other larger concerns about the building's safety.
"Our building, it just really wants to take a shower right now," she said. "These are two completely isolated incidences, sadly they both involve water in our building."
