Severe Flooding in UK

[GingerBlokey 30]

Three people have died and thousands forced from their homes after severe flooding hit England and Wales.

About 900 people are using emergency shelters in Sheffield, and dozens more were evacuated across Lincolnshire, Shropshire and Nottinghamshire.

Hundreds have fled their homes in villages near Rotherham, South Yorks, amid fears a nearby dam could collapse.

More than 20 severe flood warnings are still in place, but forecasters say the worst of the weather has passed.

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6239828.stm

Im watching BBC News 24 and it really looks awful, bridges have collapsed, cities flooded, power is down. There is a dam near Rotherham which could burst and damage a huge area of the city. 3 people have died, one of them was 14. Massive transport upset, I was in Norwich yesterday and all the services to Liverpool via Nottingham and Sheffield were cancelled and the M1 is shut.

The weather is crazy, it snowed here in Norfolk for about 20 minutes yesterday, gales in Wales, torrential rain in the Midlands, waterspouts in Yorkshire, tornados in the south. Insane.

[Cjah 15]

trippy I just heard about this hours ago....

WE have been having one uhge fire here in CA...

I hope the rains stop soon...

[Cleaner475 150]

to much rain - its been puring down with rain here in Southend! Hope it stops

need some fresh summer air

[The_Dalai_Llama 15]

Almost apocalyptic in nature from your description... hopefully the damage and loss of life is at a minimum. Luckily, the weather on my side of the ocean has been pretty good... no hurricanes to speak of. There was some flash floods in Texas this month and the Greensburg, KS tornado last month, and wildfires... alright, things here aren't as great, either. At least there's no asteroids heading for us.

[SystemUK 0]

Luckile it has been pretty dry up here in Fife, Scotland. Always is, though.

There was about 2 minutes of very heavy rain but nothing before or after that.

Heard the weather is going to get worse before it gets better, though.

[tankmank 853]

weather here in the south is nice and dry wasn't over the weekend though and last week pouring down with rain but hopefully it should get back to normal summer weather nice'n' hot and the occasional thunderstorm

[Mike the Mayor 51]

The southwest has had a bit of a battering ever since the 13th June and it looks set to continue this weekend. On Monday this week, 52.3mm of rain fell in a morning in Bristol - that's over 2 inches and twice what fell in the whole of April! What's going on? Where's summer?

June was getting off to such a great start!

[The boy formerly known as Evil Muzz 27]

Last week in my town there was about a foot and a half of water under the railway bridge, at the pedestrain crossing and outside the Primary school...

It's actually crazy, althought the weather is fine just now.... for now...

[Imprezza05 1]

this is just insain weather like half a month's worth of rain in 36 hrs... soon the critics will be saying this is all caused by global warming, but it's getting colder lol. I really feel sorry for the people affected by this.

[Meg 368]

Yikes.   A few days ago on the news, they were commenting on the floods that were here last year.   The state of Maryland alone lost 6 people due to flooding then.  I don't know why I think dying from a flood was something that only happened "back then", kinda like cholera or something.  Obviously that isn't the case.

I hope things ease up over there soon. Floods can be awful.

[Hanson784 165]

Wow! That's some bad weather.

In Chicago yesterday a massive downpour flooded streets, a portion of the I-94 and viaducts trapping people in their cars around rush hour. Many basements flooded also. The water was 3 to 5 feet deep in some places similar to the bottom picture.

 At Wrigley Field the Cubs dug out was entirely flooded during the game and water cascaded down the stairs like a waterfall nearly flooding the clubhouse. That was pretty bad.

[Amerikaner 42]

OH I WIN...last night near where i live (austin texas) in 7 hours OVER 19 inches fell...at one point it was like 2 inches to every 15 minutes

[confused04 14]

Originally posted by: SkiGeek Yikes.   A few days ago on the news, they were commenting on the floods that were here last year.   The state of Maryland alone lost 6 people due to flooding then.  I don't know why I think dying from a flood was something that only happened "back then", kinda like cholera or something.  Obviously that isn't the case.

I hope things ease up over there soon. Floods can be awful.quote>

I was just reminiscing about that.  Some areas received 15 inches or more of rain and when I visited in August 2006, I saw where the flood damage was.  There is still a huge uproar over the slow recovery on the Eastern Shore in areas such as Dorchester County where some of the damage roads have STILL not been repaired and looked as they did on June 26th, 2006.  Many people on the eastern shore are getting fed up with "disaster" relief as places are still trying to fix themselves up from Isabel which struck back in 2003. Its a bit frustrating.

[manimal_uk 0]

Originally posted by: Imprezza05 this is just insain weather like half a month's worth of rain in 36 hrs... soon the critics will be saying this is all caused by global warming, but it's getting colder lol. I really feel sorry for the people affected by this.quote>

Global warming doesnt mean everywhere will get warmer, just the climate will change and weird weather like this might become more frequent

[manimal_uk 0]

On another point, im fed up of seeing the people in some of the flooded houses complaining about the

[JanYpe 17]

Originally posted by: manimal_uk On another point, im fed up of seeing the people in some of the flooded houses complaining about the £14m given to them to help rebuild, maybe if they bought contents insurance instead of buying a packet of fags they might not be so upsetquote>

Are you asking these people to think ahead and plan for contingencies? Yeah, that'll be the day.

[SystemUK 0]

I think some were unable to get content insurence because of the flooding risk.

[Boggy1 45]

At the risk of bumping an old topic, I thought I should give an update.

The flooding at the moment is now almost worse than it was a few weeks back. Some areas have recieved almost 11 inches of rain in 12 hours. Many many rivers are TEN times their normal level. Big cities like Oxford now look more like Venice. Much of the flood water has risen to over four feet; much higher in some areas.

The worst effected areas see the flood water rising above the second story.

The British transportation network is at breaking point, and could collapse at any moment.

Thousands of people are homeless, and many more thousands are to come.

Many many people have had to be rescued by air from rooftops.

The cost is estimated to rise into the billions.

At least three counties will be without drinking water by tonight, due to the destruction of a pumping and cleaning plant.

A number of inland towns and villages are now literal islands; surrownded by a sea of water that it some areas stretches for miles.

Roads and streets all over the country are now rivers and streams. The average flood water level seems to 

be up to the top of the wheel rim on an average car.

The military is actually having to give humanitarian aid 

to some areas that are so cut off, they are only reachable by boat and air.

And worst of all, the rain shows no sign of stopping, in fact, it may get worse.

[belfastuniguy 18]

It is terrible to see people see their homes and businesses destroyed. More needs to be done to improve the river flood defences in England and across the UK.

Of course the vast amount of rain falling in such a short space of time is near impossible to deal with, the culverts and drainage systems just aren't built to take that much water and I really doubt we will see every storm water drain ripped up and replaced as that would too costly. The fact is the this kind of weather is becoming more common and we just have to start dealing with it. We can start by stop building on flood plains, not only is this blindly stupid but will eventually lead to those will the common sense to buy contents insurance leading to not being able to buy any at all.

The government can't give out huge payments to everyone without insurance while those already with it see premiums rise and rise and rise. Get some contents insurance (all insurance provide it, in some areas it will be high, but then again you are most liklely to be living on a flood plain, so what do you expect)

[Meg 368]

Originally posted by: Boggy1 

At the risk of bumping an old topic, I thought I should give an update. quote>

Bumping old topics is fine, as long as you have something additional to say, which you certainly did.   It sounds like things are awful over there.  I hope relief supplies are getting through.  It sounds like they are getting to the stage where they need to start air dropping water bottles.

  And worst of all, the rain shows no sign of stopping, in fact, it may get worse.quote>

 

Is there a name for this weather pattern?   If this rain had been accompanied by heavy winds, it would be called Hurricane Whoever.  But, like what happened here last year, this seems to be rain that just keeps going with none of the signs of a hurricane.  It seems like there should be some way of refering to this weather pattern.  "Heavy, continued rain" doesn't hack it.  Rain that reaches disaster level, like this has, should be called something.

[Boggy1 45]

Skigeek: The News is referring to it as a "Wet Monsoon". It isnt that windy suprisingly, though there is an extreame depression over the British Isles. I believe it is the same one that was meant to be up over Greenland and Iceland, which was somehow diverted here.

Ironically, last year, at this exact date, it was the hottest July and June on record. This year it is close to being the wettest on record.

The Army and Aid Forces are doing quite an exceptional job, even with the 999 (Your 911) service crashing periodically due to the number of calls. Also; most other businesses are helping out, with supermarkets and pubs and hotels providing food and water to the worst areas for free.

Quite a quoted phrase is But the only thing you can do is laugh. You've got to show the blitz spirit.. On the news and radio, interviewees seem extreamly collected. One hotel owner was trapped with fourty guests and two staff on the second story of her hotel due to a water level of six feet for 24 hours with no food or power, and her entire downstairs destroyed (she quoted it as a total right off), though during her news interview she seemed happy and calm.

An overwhelming number of people are sticking the flooding out, only calling for rescue when the water starts to actually rise above the first story.

I think the majority of the nation are just muddling through, keeping positive.

[manimal_uk 0]

We could use the Army to distribute supplies, oh no hang on we cant! they are everywhere in the world apart from in the UK.

[ILL Tonkso 1,236]

We are, read what Bogs said.

[The boy formerly known as Evil Muzz 27]

Absolutely torrential here last night, you could hear it on the roof and everything, but the weather today has been fine apart from one breif shower, it's so mixed at the moment, but I'm expecting to be inside with the heating and lights on for msot of this week, looks like we're in for more of the rain...

[Joesocwork 4]

It was discussed on Good Morning America on ABC this morning. So far I'm glad to hear that Members haven't been adversely affected, as least as you're reporting.

[Boggy1 45]

The situation has gotten slightly worse yet also slightly better. Flooding and rain has eased for the time being (though weather reports look very grim for this week),

Scratch that; the situation is worse. The rain is moving North again, and is going to hit Scotland. Wales is also badly effected. Flood waters in many areas are rising.

Over 350,000 people are without power, and almost twice that are without clean water.

The power may be fixed soon enough, but the water situation is quite dire, as a number of cleaning plants have been almost totally destroyed by the flood waters. This make take a number of weeks to solve.

The situation is rapidly decending into a catestrophe.

[MrVegetable 2]

It is saddening to see so much of Britain under so much water...I count myself lucky that my city has been practically unaffected (we've had lots of rain but a lot of sunny days and no flooding too).

Does anyone know where this depression actually ends and which way it is going? It's so big it wouldn't surprise me if changing wind directions kept it over us for as long as 2 more months...

[hamsterTK 93]

geez what a mess

its been a wet summer here too.

[gml_josea 2]

This sounds so strangely familiar. Back in 1999 non-stop almost destroyed the city that surrounds my country's main seaport, while many cities and towns where under a lot of water. It rained in one week all the water that comes down during a whole year.

It won't last much longer, I bet that in less than one week climate wilkl come back to normal....I hope.

[belfastuniguy 18]

It is an awful situation, we just can't deal with that much rain.

I heard the weather will continue to be wet and horrid most likely throughout the summer as the gulf stream which is usually north of the UK and as such keeps low depressions away in summer is much further south and as such the high systems (sunny and warm) are over Europe and not the UK.

I feel very fortunate in Northern Ireland it has been wet, but no flooding here and today has been a fantastic day, sunny and warm, i had lunch with friends in the park today, first time I have been able to do that in weeks.