[Closed] Flooding

I'm a bit confused by conflicting reports saying it's both unprecedented and the worst in 70 years. Can't be both.

Having worked in I surance claims, I know how awful it is for both home owners and businesses. Dirty, horrible stinking mess left behind that ruins peoples lives for months.

Currently trying to persuade MrsMC to divert holiday plans from France to somewhere here that needs our money more.

I'm surprised nobody has blamed gay marriage yet...

On a more serious note, Mr Mule Senior was (now retired) an architect, and sat on the planning advisory panel for the local council for several years until he got fed up with spending pretty much every meeting saying "Why in the name of * do you persist in building on floodplains you bungle*s"

(I may have paraphrased... but not by much)

Nickc - Water/mud bomb is very much a good way to describe Hebden. And now it's raining again. Awesome.

Lots of folk out helping in Hebden today but the place is devastated. Quite a few businesses won't be reopening at all I don't think. Very sad.

Gonna go back out tomorrow and see what we can do.

that's properly shit, I'll be down tomorrow to help out where I can

Project, thanks for the info, I'll pass that on to her, it might be that the YH in Coniston* will get in touch with her anyway, but too much info is better than not enough when it's a seven hour journey involved.
*She's just got a new job as relief manager, having been staff at the YH in Conwy for the last couple of years, so not wanting to get off to a bad start by being late back, but current circumstances may dictate otherwise.

I'm a bit confused by conflicting reports saying it's both unprecedented and the worst in 70 years. Can't be both

Grum + Nickc - I'll be down again tomorrow, happy to feed you lot curry after if you're coming past. I'll also be getting out for a brief ride as I need to get my head round all this and see how flipped the trails are.

This is a terrible situation.
I'm from Mytholmroyd and still have family there so dropped down today to help out.
Russell Dean's furniture store looks like a riot has taken place inside, with the front windows blown out.
On the other side, the rear wall of whitesans travel has washed into the river.
My niece lives up Craig road and had water up to he mantel piece and my dad's mill in Mytholmroyd was under around 6 foot of water. I went in with him today to try and pre-empt what the Insurane assessor may say tomorrow but on the assumption that electronic weaving machines were fully submerged for around 12 hours, looks like a write off.
Gutted.

Just heard that the 200 year old bridge to st Stephens church in Copley has gone.

Flip.

Be intresting to see where all the tradesmen come from to repair all the damage and whos going to pay us, seems as if many where not insured, and if they where insurance companies will most probably squirm out of paying to much out.

Ffs, this is what insurance is for. I led our in house response team at the Perth floods in the 90s we literally went up with cheque books and wrote cheques on the spot for people based on what we could see they needed in the short term.

If people aren't insured, that is a separate issue.

Talked to two shop owners in Hebden who were not insured. They could not get insurance again after the floods in 2012. Home owner living beside my friend has a £10,000 excess on their property, again, from floods in 2012.

If people [s]aren't[/s]CANT AFFORD TO BE insured, that is a separate issue.

Lots happened since the 1990,s to make insurance un affordable or not available

Premiums and excesses reflect the risk you present sadly. Shopping around specialist underwriters might help, but ultimately, that's how it works.

Big problem is that post war work reduced recent incidents of flooding in places where it is now happening again, and people have been badly stung buying houses in places that hadn't flooded for years.

Not trying to diminish the horror of it or the financial implications. But the house I was brought up in had a permanent tide mark from the 1953 floods, friends had grandparents in Yalding who lived up stairs in the winter, Matlock has flood markers on one of the bridges from floods that were several feet deep and easily within living memory.

It has sadly always happened and always will.

[url= http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/flooding-cause-government-would-keep-10580092 ]flood[/url]

thanks for the responce More cash, any idea over whats like to happen to thgose in york who where deliberately flooded by the EA after flood gates where opened.

What Philip Walling fails to mention is a lot of farmers have also benefited from the European Water Framework Directive in that they get new cattle drinkers, fencing and bank repairs. And the Environment Agency still do dredging just not on the scale of it did 25 years ago and the conservationist put a halt on a lot of dredging and bushing works. And also not all of the dredging has to be carted away some of it is placed to help build up banks and low spots.

Presumably the EA have tough choices to make sometimes? Not my area of expertise but I seem to recall that the last time the Derwent flooded through Matlock, Belper and Derby 5-6 years ago it was because they had had to release the waters at the Derwent reservoirs as they were dangerously high.

Dredging is an interesting point in that article. There are arguments for and against, but I know that where we lived on the edge of the Fens the river that left the tidemark in 53 was fine when it was dreged when I was a kid, but after they stopped dredging it peaked higher and higher, causing my parents to move, and within a couple of years of them moving they had the first flood alert for 30 years. Dredging may or may not have been a factor.

They used to pile the dredged material to build up flood banks iirc

I'm fairly sure tod used to flood more than hebden when I was a kid and remember at least twice as a kid wading through the town in my wellies.

I can only assume that some of the work reduce tod flooding has passed the water further down the valley as hebden always seems worse these days.

Sea levels are rising. Should we dredge the sea?

If It helps anyone out, At work we have 4 x 100mtr rolls of lay flat blue water hose. We also have a box of joiners and the jubilee clips to with them.
We paid around £500 for these and never used them.
I am pretty sure I can sell thm to anyone who needs them for alot less than that . You will need to source a pump of some sort , but 400m of pipe will move water well away from any flooded cellars etc.
As its Xmas / Bank holidy shipping will be a problem but I can prob get them away Tuesday on an overnight.
If I said all 4 rolls for 1/2 price £250 = £62.50 a roll, delivered, thats cheaper than fleabay.
Pm me if your desperate and include a phone no. and I will see what I can do . Can probably sell each roll individualy if that helps anyone out.
Not trying to profit from anyones misfortune , we have them , people need them . I will be fired if I agree to give them away , and am taking some risk in selling them for half what we paid without a nod from a director. But if they kick off I can cover the diffrence.

Glad to live down south , but have had the sea lapping at my front door and the wheely bins swimming laps of the car park so have had flooding experience

Has more monbiot not been predicting this for years?
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/13/flooding-public-spending-britain-europe-policies-homes

[url= http://https://flic.kr/p/BCu3RH ]flooding[/url]

The only way one of our relatives could get insurance was to pay an extra 8 or 10 grand when they did repairs after floods in '08 or '09.
House is basically waterproofed and tiled up to 4 foot from the floor. Only electric cable less than 5 foot from the floor is the main supply and consumer unit (that is actually semi-sealed), the replacement ring main is now in the ceiling with spurs coming down to the high level sockets.
Sump and pump under the stairs, massive auxiliary pump ready to go in the garage.
Metre high flood wall in the middle of the garden. Wall at the river bank is now nearly a metre thick and a 30-40 cm higher than it used to be, and they have a flood barrier to the road (water comes in both ways, river and road).

Benefits include that the last three or four floods have needed no more than a couple of hours with a hose, mop and bucket and some help from the neighbours to get the furniture back down stairs.
That includes 50 cm of water sloshing round the house last winter. They were only out of the house for one night.

Insurance is now affordable. But only covers the structure........ (this is not far from Harrogate)

For those that don't live locally the flooding up here is not like flooding on the Somerset levels or other fliod plains. The rivers around here are not silty meandering things but rocky bottomed and often walled up, in Rawtenstall the Irwell is usual 15ft below it's side, on Saturday it was within a foot or so of the top.

The flooding occurs as the water rushes through, people on the side of hills get flooded as water rushes in the backdoor and out the front. The flood defences are designed to sliw the flow, Tod park can be deliberately flooded, Stacksteads has a huge holding tank etc. My neighbour who used to live in Tod said the flooding wasn't as bad there as previously althoigh still bad. There rains were pretty bad, I've never known Padiham flood or Whalley.

Don't know what the answer is but I can't see what can be done for places like Hebden where many buildings are at the same level as the canal and river.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/uk-weather-cause-flooding-government-7078739
Interesting article, wonder what the collective make of this?

Should someone set up a thread identifying businesses in the areas affected that could be supported through online means (once they are operational again) ?

He has a valid point

You also to add in windfarms on the high moors where the access infrastructure causes massive loss in peat and the purpose made drainage accelerates the transit of water off the moors

Flood plains flood, man made interventions reduce the incidence but anyone looking at the geography must realise that the landscape was formed with massive inundations periodically

Interesting article, wonder what the collective make of this?

It's a shockingly poorly written article. Dredging is a lot more complex than they seem to think. And harking back to what people used to do is absurd given that most of our problems now are caused by what people did a hundred-odd years ago.

There was a big debate about dredging last time this happened iirc.

Canal at Tod is one of the big problems at the moment:

[img] [/img]

When more rain arrives - that is going straight into the Calder through those allotments on the RHS.

You also to add in windfarms on the high moors where the access infrastructure causes massive loss in peat and the purpose made drainage accelerates the transit of water off the moors

If windfarms came in the top 100 contributors to flooding I would be [s]suprised[/s]amazed. (Unless you are Trump in which case I claim my 5 tacky golden tanning salon tokens).

Whoa.
Not managed to get out yet - take it all the canalside housing further up toward Tod and down toward Hebden has gone?

You can't really blame the Tories. Yet.

It's a combination of things:

Climate change - predications suggest that stormy weather is becoming more and mor common. We don't get drizzle any more, just vast quantities of water all in a short space of time. Too fast for thr drains to deal with

Idiotic planning permission - building on flood plans is dumb. The developers build a big drain to get the water off their development. Which means the next place downstream has even more water to deal with. There must be a reason for this - it can't just be the developers making money. Plus why aren't councils insisting old deralict properties are knocked down and redeveloped first?

No planning permission for removal of lawns, trees, adding brickweave driveways all over the place. Grass holds a ridiculous amount of water. brickweave and tarmac drain super fast - but then the next place downstream has even more water to deal with.

Spending cuts - EA hasn't got enough money to build and maintain storm drains. Farmers don't care about ditches. The unsustainable farming practices in the UK, plus supermarkets remove any profit the farmer makes. They don't have the money/time to worry about someone elses land flooding.

I really feel sorry for people who cannot sell their house because of the flooding and who cannot afford to insure them.

Both Labour and the Tories have been in power while this is allowed to go on. What annoys me is the current politicians constantly using the word Unprecedented. All the time. It's not unprecedented. It's the new norm!
Until they accept this then it's only going to get worse.

Both Labour and the Tories have been in power while this is allowed to go on. What annoys me is the current politicians constantly using the word Unprecedented. All the time. It's not unprecedented. It's the new norm!

It sort of is unprecedented as some of the river levels have broken the previous highs by more than a couple of metres!

Rusty Spanner - Member
Whoa.
Not managed to get out yet - take it all the canalside housing further up toward Tod and down toward Hebden has gone?

From what I'm aware that is the only breach at the moment.

Good.
Thanks for the updates.

I see you, George Osborne.
I see your smarmy face, like a gilded ham or the distilled essence of a hundred estate agents congealed into flesh. I see the single tear rolling down your face at Thatcher's funeral, the only one you've ever shed. I see the cleft in your nose, which presumably is the slot the city bankers swipe their cards through every time they pop in to make a withdrawal from the treasury. I see you wince every time you try to sit down in your expensive leather chair, the long handle of the silver spoon constantly jabbing you in the walls of your colon. It's painful, isn't it, George Osborne? But you wouldn't change it for the world, and you can afford plenty of numbing agents that come in white powders after all.
I see the tinted glass of your London penthouse, George Osborne, the people running around below you like ants. You're a king up here, aren't you? You're like Marie Antoinette, except you're even hoarding the cake and everyone else can eat shit. You're a guffawing toff, George Osborne, a honking parasite, a greasy snake-oil salesman poured into a suit and picking the county apart at the seams. Cuts upon cuts upon cuts, George Osborne, packaged up in lies and platitudes and sold by your friends in the media to the proletariat you despise.
Cuts! Lovely, lovely cuts. It's easy to cut stuff from a London penthouse, isn't it, George Osborne? You're safe up here, after all.
I see the clouds darkening, George Osborne, and I hear the rain drumming on the streets. I see the waters rising, sluicing off the fields, filling the rivers that haven't been dredged in months. Cuts! Lovely cuts. I see the water pouring over the flood defences, into homes and shops, the feeble token investment you've made in barriers and walls doing nothing to avert disaster. Cuts!
I hear the phone ringing as the storm rages outside, George Osborne. I hear you giggle, ducking down in your seat, sitting up again and inhaling deeply, your pupils blown and your nose dusted in powder. Cuts! **** 'em, George Osborne. You're having a blast, aren't you?
I see the cars swept away, George Osborne, the waters pouring even over the Thames Barrier. I see the swirling tide cascade through the streets, taking black cabs and buses with it. I hear the storm raging, the torrent hammering down, the whirlpools sucking down rubble and collapsing buildings.
And still you laugh, George Osborne. Cuts! Who needs the North anyway? Money wasn't an object for Somerset, but they voted for you, so they get sandbags. You're sure everything is fine, but you're so ****ing high now you haven't looked out the window and you've no idea what's coming.
I see the water pour over the tops of all but the highest buildings. It's just two floors below you now, nearly the whole of London swallowed by the maelstrom. In the distant fog I see the lights and I hear the thunderous horn. Something is coming, George Osborne. Something huge, something angry, something mechanical and yet very much alive.
I see the cogs and the great gears whirring in the floating fortress, George Osborne. I see the paddles splashing, the great chimneys pouring smoke, the furnaces burning. I feel the heat of molten metal and hear the terrible industrial groaning. I see the sailors, each of them stony-faced and staring ahead, fixed on you in the distance. I see their stern faces and I hear their growled orders. It's here, George Osborne. It's not a fiction or a fairytale. It's here, and it's coming for you.
The Northern Powerhouse, George Osborne. It's here and it's pissed off and it's coming for you.
I see the great fortress power through the squall, the waters boiling away in great gouts of steam in its wake. I see it crash through the tip of the Shard, the clouds of shattered glass sparkling in the sudden light cast by a lightning strike. I hear you laughing obliviously, George Osborne. I see you thrown to the floor and shrieking like a baby as the Powerhouse smashes into your building.
I see the girders twist, George Osborne, parting like shattered teeth to expose you to the howling wind and rain. I see the grappling hooks thrown into the room, catching on mahogany furniture and priceless fur rugs. I see you scramble to your feet, laughing manically, blood pouring from one powdered nostril. I hear you roar as the sailors rappel down the lines, landing in the room and lining up before you.
Northerners. Your natural enemy, George Osborne.
I see them draw their knives, George Osborne. I see their thin blades and razor edges. Ten men, and a hundred cuts each.
Cuts, George Osborne. Lovely, lovely cuts. Cuts to services. Cuts to welfare spending. Cuts to flesh.
Death by a thousand cuts, George Osborne.
I see you, George Osborne. I ****ing see you.

From facebook

I'm no expert but I've read a lot of stuff saying the dredging thing is a load of bollocks. Just means faster flowing water hitting somewhere further downstream. It can work in certain areas but would be of no use to Calderdale, apparently.

I've woken up with rotten lurgy - hopefully not related to sweeping out manky flood water yesterday. Going to try and head down into town and help for a bit anyway.

Climate scientists might as well been talking out of there arses for the notice government has taken. Wetter Milder winters was the warning. They should used "Biblically Wet and Stupidly warm winters" but would have been accused of Hyperbolic scaremongering. Tories still pay lip service to Climate Change and will never use the A word it's a lefty/green conspiracy I tell ya !

Road update from WestYorks Police: Movement in the A646 Burnley Rd into Hebden Bridge has reduced it to one lane causing delays.Please avoid.

[img] [/img]

To the left of that is the canal and the Calder. Downstream, Mytholmroyd

Woodlikesbeer +1

Got to say you guys in the Flood area have my sympathies, couldn't believe it when I eventually re surfaced after Christmas to read about it. So sorry for you all, there are quite a lot of folk on this forum from up that way aren't there? Terrible thing flooding.

Plus why aren't councils insisting old deralict properties are knocked down and redeveloped first?

A couple of reasons. First there's not as much profit as building on green land. Second, just because a property is empty and / or derelict it still has an owner. Thousands of properties across the country are being kept empty whilst the value of the land they are built on increases. If they are rented out, then expense is incurred.

There is not a housing shortage in this country, there is a shortage of affordable housing. How is building thousands of detached properties on green land going to address this?. It's not. It just generates more money.

Coyote has really hit the nail on the head. Addressing it could deal with quite a few societal issues.

We had a "what would you do if you won the £100 million Euros jackpot" conversation at work a couple of weeks ago. I said I'd keep £10 million for me and plough the rest into a charitable trust building/offering affordable rental housing on derelict/brown field sites.

Pretty sure it would be viable if you take away the over riding profit motive. Maybe offer some of those in need of the housing apprenticeships and jobs in the building trades involved as well.