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The Great Flood - one year on
One year ago this week hundreds of homes in Chesterfield were devastated when a deluge of rain caused extensive flooding.
On June 25, 2007, the Rivers Rother, Hipper and Whitting burst their banks and poured into 500 properties in the Brampton, Tapton and Spital areas of the town.
Ravenside Retail Park, Horns Bridge roundabout and Queen's Park were filled with several feet of water and flooded roads caused traffic chaos throughout the area.
Derbyshire Times reporter Jennifer Ivers has been speaking to some of the worst-affected victims about how they've put their lives back together and has asked environment chiefs what is being done to prevent another flooding disaster.
BACK HOME AT LONG LAST
Anne Squires and her two young daughters – who had to be rescued from their home by neighbours as it flooded last summer – have been waiting all year to move back in.
Their rented house on Tapton Terrace was devastated by over 4ft of water on June 25, and since then Anne, Persia (5) and 19-month-old Arwen have been living with friends in North Wingfield.
But the family were finally able to return home at the weekend after extensive repair work – including re-flooring downstairs, re-plastering the walls and re-wiring throughout – was completed by the Housing Association.
Anne (23) said: "I'm glad to move back in but nervous about it flooding again."
The single mum recalled the "nightmare" of the afternoon last summer when water started pouring into her home.
She said: "It happened really quickly, it was very scary. I tried to save a few things that were on the floor but I lost absolutely everything downstairs."
The family became trapped as the water gushed in, and while Anne's mum helped get Persia out, Arwen – then just six months old – had to be floated to safety on a tray by a neighbour.
Anne, who did not have home insurance, was one of 55 victims who received financial help from the Chesterfield Flood Victims' Appeal, which was set up by Zion Church and Cllr Toby Perkins, and raised 12,500.
Anne said: "I want to say a big thank to all the people who have helped me. I don't think I would have got through this without them."LABOUR OF LOVE CREATES HAVEN
Flood victim Andrew Holmes is enjoying the calm after the storm having transformed the "big bloody field" that was his ruined garden into a tropical paradise.
His property, on Hipper Street West, was flooded with 3ft of water, which destroyed his carefully-tended back yard and gutted the ground floor of his home.
Since then, Andrew (29) has devoted much of his spare time to the garden – which boasts palm, olive and banana trees – and is now hoping to pick up a prize in the Chesterfield in Bloom awards.
He said: "It's been my counsellor, something to focus on and try to achieve.
"I want people who come to the garden to see that nature can do a bad thing but it can reward in other ways."
Andrew and partner Sarah (21) refused to leave their newly-purchased home after it flooded last June because of problems with looting in the area.
They lived upstairs, Noah's Ark style, with dog Gizmo, two finches Jan and Carol, four lizards Reggie, Buzz, Jeffrey and Screech, and hamster Harry, until March this year.
Andrew, a chef at Woodheads in Chesterfield, said: "We were living in squalor, it was horrible.
"There was no electricity or hot water for weeks. We survived on takeaway food and every Pot Noodle under the sun."
He said the house, which was insured and suffered almost 70,000 worth of damage, is now habitable but there is still work to do.
Andrew said: "I want to get the inside as we'd like it, live in it and make it our own."
CHIEFS MOVE TO RELIEVE PRESSURE
Environment chiefs will outline plans for flood alleviation schemes in Chesterfield at meetings in the worst-hit parts of the town this week.
Representatives from the Environment Agency (EA) will be at flood fairs, organised by Chesterfield Borough Council and Derbyshire County Council, tonight and Monday.
EA flood team leader Steve Wragg said flooding is a natural process and cannot be completely prevented or defended against but plans were being made to reduce the flood risk to communities.
He added: "We are working on an overall strategy for areas at risk of flooding in Chesterfield and will be attending a number of drop-in sessions with residents to discuss some of the specific proposals."
The EA is currently putting together a bid to secure funding for a flood alleviation scheme on the River Hipper, which would reduce the risk to the 100 properties and 60 businesses devastated by flooding last June.
This would include an up-stream water storage area at Holymoorside, and small localised defences along the river.
In the longer term the EA is working with the Avenue Remediation Project, led by East Midlands Development Agency, on designs for a 250,000 cubic meter floodwater storage reservoir at the former coking works site.
Mr Wragg said: "This would reduce flood risk to properties on the River Rother in Chesterfield as far down stream as Tapton Terrace."
Chesterfield Borough Council won a 62,000 grant from the EA to clear the town's main watercourses and work is now underway on the Rivers Whitting, Drone, Rother, Hipper, and Doe Lea.
The authority sent out invitations to residents affected by last summer's floods for community flood fairs this week.
FUNDING IS VITAL TO AVOID REPEAT TURMOIL SAYS MP
Chesterfield's MP has hit out at delayed Government funding for flood prevention schemes, saying it could be years before the town gets new defences.
Paul Holmes said there would be no new money until 2010/11 and even then Chesterfield would be competing for funds with worse-hit areas such as Hull and Sheffield.
He said:"Government advice appears to be cross your fingers and hope it doesn't rain hard for many years to come.
"More money should be made available for prevention and it should be brought forward, starting this year."
Mr Holmes said the Environment Agency had been quick to draw up flood prevention plans but would have to wait to bid for Government funds.
And if unsuccessful, the organisation would have to appeal to local businesses and councils for cash.
The Chesterfield MP said the matter should have been given more urgency and it was 'wishful thinking' to say that last summer's floods were a once in a hundred year event.
He added: "Climate change is making the weather more volatile and flooding more likely."LIGHTNING STRIKES TWICE!
On June 25, Chesterfield was hit by "the most tremendous storm ever remembered".
No, that is not a description of last summer's floods, but a quote from a report in the Derbyshire Courier* newspaper about a remarkably similar disaster on the same date in 1830.
Torrential rain, accompanied by thunder and lightning, started to fall at midnight and continued for three hours.
The report reads: "In a very short space of time, rivulets and ditches became broad and rapid rivers, carrying in their course devastation and alarm, and either sweeping away, or considerably damaging every bridge which they encountered."
The River Hipper burst its banks and poured into neighbouring industrial and residential properties – flooding them with three feet of water.
The Courier reports the lucky escape of factory-worker Job Barker and his family: "Nearly one side of the house was instantly swept away, the water rushing in with overwhelming force, carrying away the furniture and putting the lives of the inmates in such peril as to render extraordinary exertions necessary for their rescue."
Great numbers of cows and sheep were drowned, and much crop destroyed in the floods which swept through farmland.
The report concludes: "We are thankful to find that amidst the many disasters incident to this calamity, human life has providentially been spared, a circumstance almost miraculous, when we reflect on the suddenness with which the flood rushed at midnight into numerous houses, in many of which the inmates were soundly sleeping."
* Quoted in 'The History of Chesterfield', published by Thomas Ford in 1839.
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Thursday 24 May 2012
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