Chris Evans had John Kettley on this morning about it – they kind of concluded that yes, this weather is pretty extreme for us, more for the relntlessness than the intensity. It’s like there’s three storms hovering off the coast, we’ve had one, and now the other two are lining up to have a bash.

The storm surge, or the hurricane of ’87 were isloated incidents. The storms at the moment seem to be relentless, even if individually they aren’t that bad. I think thats what makes it significantly different to anything that’s gone before.

The 53 surge killed 100 people on Canvey Island, and affected great swathes of the east coast

Even the 87 windstorm killed 18 in one day, destroyed large amounts of infrastructure and left hundreds of thousands without power, in some cases, for many weeks.

Cumulatively, the current bad weather is not even beginning to approach this scale.

Not unprecented either in the UK or elsewhere.

Hyperbole, 24 hour news, politicos, headlines….the usual mixture.

Can’t you just shoot the water? Blow it up a bit?

Surely you can dig some holes, fill them in, repeat, etc?

They should pipe it up north. Some of our reservoirs aren’t even full yet.

Okay, we have a lot of rain and high seas etc but if it wasnt for human meddling in the landscape and greed by developers and shortsightedness by planners and people buying houses etc then people wouldnt be in this mess.

If it wasn’t for human meddling in the landscape we wouldn’t all be here now would we?

Can’t you just shoot the water? Blow it up a bit?

That’s what they’ve called the Army in for isn’t it?

I guess we could boil it away? How many millions of tons of water do you reckon we have? Need to do a quick back of the envelope calculation.

If it wasn’t for human meddling in the landscape we wouldn’t all be here now would we?

Well we are the biggest natural disaster to hit the planet.

If you want extreme weather disasters, don’t forget the ’52 Lynmouth flood. 9 inches of rain in 24 hours, 100 houses destroyed and 34 dead overnight.

If we’re including disasters which are the combination of weather and man’s meddling, how about this one? 4,000 plus dead over four days and its aftermath.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2012/dec/05/60-years-great-smog-london-in-pictures

I do believe that’s it’s only technically a disaster if Bankers are inconvenienced. Otherwise, it’s just a minor incident.

John Kettley is a weatherman, a weatherman, a weatherman…

the media and political attention certainly did seem to ramp up a notch when the flooding spread from SW into SE commuter belt.

Why is it surprising or unfair that flooding is a bigger deal when it happens somewhere lots of people live instead of a place where practically no one lives?

I think it’s ‘unparalleled’ as the more accurate ‘bit of a pain in the ass but not really all that problematic for the vast majority of people even in the South’ isn’t quite so media friendly.

I am being inconvenienced at the moment with the village fairly well flooded in parts, but it isn’t exactly armageddon. Ocado are still delivering 😀

I don’t think comparing fatalities with much older events is really a valid comparison; safety is a much higher priority now so stuff is so much safer and many relevant fields are simply much better now; communications, infrastructure, risk management and weather forecasting have greatly improved in the last few decades.

If Lynmouth happened now it could have been predicted earlier, residents could have been informed more reliably, rivers and forests are managed with flood risk a higher priority, and assistance could have arrived more rapidly and much better equipped.

I was quite surprised to see Army 4 tonners rolling down Marlow high street last night. But then again I did see that the kiddy swings in the park had been cordoned off so maybe more help was needed. We added our names to the local volunteer list, but we keep being told that no requests for help have been received around here.

This morning I spoke to an old lady who lives on Long Island in the middle of the Thames. She has lived there for 60 years and today she decided to move out to a hotel. Apparently the water was lapping at her bottom step. She inferred that having those 60 years experience meant she knew more about Thames flooding than most. She was not worried too much saying that the signs were there that the water was managing itself and it would not get that much worse.

If Lynmouth happened now it could have been predicted earlier

you mean like boscastle was?

Yep, Operation ‘Bugger All’ seems to sum it up nicely.

while i find it quite sad that any/every ‘disaster’ must be jumped upon by both the media (to fill airtime) and politicians (for pre election point scoring)

i am actually more offended by the general publics greedy consumption of that media* and knee jerk affiliation with their previously chosen and often lifelong political party (none of which caused this nor are able to fix it)

*guilty as the rest of you – on the news last night they found someone willing to blame the Thames on a lack of dredging, that could only be topped if he had gotten in a mention of either Thatcher or Hitler.

When the affluent are in the effluent the politicians suddenly wake up.

Too little effort too late, same old, same old.

you mean like boscastle was?

Fair point! Even so though, wikipedia says the total cost to life and limb was a single broken thumb, so while it’s not perfect it’s still an enormous improvement!

Yes it has rained a lot and for a long time, but this is the UK where it rains a lot and for a long time.

So whats different this time?

Not dredging rivers is the obvious mistake? of is it?

I suggest the deliberate choice to abandon water management (dredging rivers, clearing culverts, chines, road drains, etc,etc) by the last 3 Government.s The Environment Agency bending to pressure groups such as RSPB, save the water voles, etc, etc allowing what money that was available to be frittered away saving animals not protecting lives and property.

So you see BLAME can be apportioned and My Mate Dave doesn’t want to attract any blame especially as the election is just round the corner, as it was succinctly put earlier

affluent are in the effluent it matters

So send in the Army after you made 20,000 of them redundant and look for a scape goat, thankfully one of Blair’s cronies head the EA, phew that was stroke of luck.

Is it political, “YES” the south overreacting “YES”, media frenzy “YES or it’s actually worse than it looks “Its bad but in comparison to 2008 not really”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26165914 First few mins London 1947

Lots of other places flooded over the years mostly oop north and Wales, and nothing got done, strangely when Effluent meets affluent, the army is brought in, perhaps the ones in power read my previous thread title and thought, yes what do they do,lets get them to work,makes good tv snippets, and shows daily mail readers we are doing something.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/what-do-army-squaddies-do-all-day-when-there-is-no-war

Staines-Upon-Thames???!!! 😯

WTF?!

That’s like Hamble-le-Rice. FFS!

Since when was Staines given a fancy name with hyphen’s? About the time someone figured that no one could afford inner M25 property and it’s cheaper to make a very dour concrete town sound a little more desirable to commute from. Must be doing wonders for the property prices, except for the current situation of it being Staines-in-Thames 🙂

*guilty as the rest of you – on the news last night they found someone willing to blame the Thames on a lack of dredging, that could only be topped if he had gotten in a mention of either Thatcher or Hitler.

Not often we see Godwin’s law in action on STW!

But it makes the best news we’ve had in a long time, I just love seeing 7 figure Thames view homes full of water, don’t see why the reporters aren’t just laughing.

Yes it has rained a lot and for a long time, but this is the UK where it rains a lot and for a long time

Not like this. This is pretty unusual.

I don’t remember the Yorkshire floods lasting months btw, did they?

So Beeboid Harrabin and the Met Office suspect man made climate change is at play. These would be same people who in November forecast a drier than average winter ?

The gymnastics being used to link the current floods and AGW are gold medal worthy.

I don’t remember the Yorkshire floods lasting months btw, did they?

Thats because the news got bored and went off to cover a stolen horse!

As it’s on the news again down here in Oz there is nothing about the areas that have been under for months just the posh bits.

Did they last for months then?

Met Office suspect man made climate change is at play. These would be same people who in November forecast a drier than average winter

a) no
b) they said some signs might indicate a dry winter but you can never really tell
c) stop being so thick

Radio 2 news this morning referred to the floods as the “worst in living memory”.

b) they said some signs might indicate a dry winter but you can never really tell

So what gives you any confidence in their longer term predictions?

peterfile – Member
Radio 2 news this morning referred to the floods as the “worst in living memory”.

Was that before a Jeremy Vine Factastic(TM) phone in

haha, no idea 🙂 just flicked over at 7am to catch Moira Stewart delivering the bad news to the nation south

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26172688

“This year, each of the [rain] events that we’ve seen has not been notable but the rainfall accumulation has been exceptional,” says Simon Parry from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. He points to the figures for the River Thames, which has been above what is regarded as a notable high-flow mark since Christmas Eve, “which is twice as long as any time in the last 130 years”.

Meanwhile, 200,000 Indonesians affected by eruption of Mt Kelud…