Preparing for flooding

Little John · Post by **Little John** » 21 Jul 2012, 15:43

SleeperService wrote:The example I gave you'd have needed a hell of a pump. IIRC the area contained was about 50M by 100M. The bank was about 2.5M high. It filled in about ten minutes

I think the island is safest with all things considered.

Yeah, I'd agree

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 22 Jul 2012, 10:20

The difference is between a deluge flowing over the land such as when a dam breaks and between a raising of the water table.

When you live on low lying ground the water that falls on the surround higher grounds flows not only over ground to you but also seeps (very quickly) through the ground.

The only solution for those living on flood plains is to move to or make their own higher ground.

Or maybe stilts.

Post by **adam2** » 22 Jul 2012, 11:06

On heavy clay soil that is not too porous, than a dyke or embankment works well. Some water will rise up through the soil, but it wont be much, and rain will fall within the protected area.
Modest amounts of water are easily removed with a pump (duplicated in case of failure)
On porous soil, then it wont work, water will rise up quicker than any reasonable pump can remove it.

A mound or island is certainly worth considering for new construction, and also to save livestock and vehicles.

There is a lot of land prone to flooding that could make excellent grazing, provided that the farm buildings, vehicles and livestock are safe on a mound. Most animals can swim, but would soon perish without shelter on higher land.

I once saw a farm gate that opened automaticly in case of flooding, so as to allow cattle to escape from their usual field to a higher one.

Hagrid · Post by **Hagrid** » 10 Oct 2012, 17:17

if i lived in an area that got flooded i think i'd move, if i knew a place got flooded REGULARLY i wouldn't move there in the first place.

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 10 Oct 2012, 18:53

There may well be other advantages (cheapness, fertile soil, central location) that make it worthwhile.

Opposite The King's Arms is a hotel, right on the river, whose ground floor is basically just a car-park with reinforced arches. They have an EA hotline like the King's Arms do, and guests simply move their cars.

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 10 Oct 2012, 21:41

They might have the hotline now RC, but back in Autumn 2001/2 (?) (the year Tony Blair came to see the flooding in York) when I last stood on the bridge and saw the river up to the windows of the King's Arms, the cars parked under the arches were drowned and unmoveable! My brother lives in Easingwold - lovely village.

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 11 Oct 2012, 14:08

It was autumn 2000, but yes I get your point. Any system that relies on "live" warnings isn't going to be infallible. They have to come out in good time, and (frankly) people have to believe them.

I don't park my bike in its usual place next to the King's Arms if I'm in town when it's been raining a lot (for example).

Post by **adam2** » 11 Oct 2012, 14:33

Some land near Minehead was recently sold relatively cheaply, it is fertile farmland but liable to flooding.
The new owner intends to graze beef cattle on this land, he has other land nearby and can easliy move the animals if flooding is expected.

He states that beef produced from seaside grazing tastes better.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 16 Oct 2012, 17:30

Environment Agency just wrote in an e-mailed alert:

"Tidal flooding of areas near the Lincolnshire Coastline
We are expecting unusually high astronmical tide levels along Lincolnhsire coast on Wednesday 17th October. The high tides combined with strong winds may result in wind-blown spray and wave splash causing localised pooling of water behind the sea defences. The time and date of the forecast high water is 07:30 on 17 October 2012."

I hope their forecasting is better than their spelling.

Post by **adam2** » 21 Oct 2012, 11:16

The grazing land to which I refered a few posts back has just been flooded, entirely as expected in the recent very heavy rain.

Cattle are more sensible than I thought, they all crowded around the gate to higher land and bellowed loudly BEFORE the lower land was flooded.

5 of the 6 sheep were saved, the other had a death wish and leaped into a fast flowing drainage ditch

(sheep are not reared for sale, the small numbers are to eat, and for meat as gifts)

Post by **adam2** » 08 Dec 2015, 12:01

Time to re-visit this old thread in view of the severe flooding and consequent power failures in many northern parts of the UK.

It seems to me that there was a most regrettable lack of preparations for an entirely foreseeable disaster, that has after all occurred before.

Not everyone is in a position to make some of thorough and rather expensive preps discussed earlier in this thread, but it does seem that an awful lot of people made no preparations whatsoever.

I would suggest as an absolute minimum the following.
Store upstairs the following supplies
A battery lantern and spare batteries
A torch and spare batteries
Candles and matches
A battery radio and spare batteries
First aid supplies
Canned food to last a week
Bottled water to last a week
Disposable tableware
Toilet paper and improvised toilet arrangements.

That should be within financial reach of almost everyone, most households already have much of what is on that list, it is a largely a case of keeping supplies upstairs, preferably high up in case of very deep flooding.

Slightly more elaborate precautions that are within reach of most people could include in addition
A portable chemical closet as used for camping
An oil or LPG camping cooker and spare fuel
An oil or LPG room heater and spare fuel
Oil or LPG lights and spare parts and fuel
More extensive first aid supplies including stocks of common medications.
Additional warm bedding beyond that normally used.
Basic tools to facilitate minor repairs and improvisations.
Defensive equipment.
Double quantities of all the consumables in the first list.

Most of this is useful for breakdowns and emergencies in general not just for flooding.

Post by **clv101** » 08 Dec 2015, 21:51

Anyone who hasn't made provision to continue living at home, in relative comfort, for a few days without electricity is a fool IMO. It's pretty straightforward to maintain food/water, energy, sanitation supplies and every year thousands of people do find themselves facing power cuts, flooding, snowed in etc...

boisdevie · Post by **boisdevie** » 09 Dec 2015, 16:26

clv101 wrote:Anyone who hasn't made provision to continue living at home, in relative comfort, for a few days without electricity is a fool IMO. It's pretty straightforward to maintain food/water, energy, sanitation supplies and every year thousands of people do find themselves facing power cuts, flooding, snowed in etc...

The recent floods here in Lancaster have certainly woke up a few people in this respect. When 'it couldn't possibly happen' changes into 'it's happened' people have to reconsider things.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 09 Dec 2015, 18:13

When it's happened twice before in that last few years and the weather forecasts were saying that is was going to happen again in the next 24 hours you begin to wonder about the mental capacity of the folk who had obviously done nothing to get their stuff raised off the floor let alone upstairs! You could have sympathy for them if they had raised stuff and the flood had been higher than expected but most of the TV pictures were of people who had done absolutely nothing.

We've had 1 deg C warming and politicians are saying that 2 deg will be "safe" despite the fact that weather events are getting more extreme so anyone being flooded regularly now, and I include in that anybody who has been flooded three times in the last ten years, is going to be flooded even more regularly in the future.

Unless the government do some of the things that they have been advised to do, but taken the reports off agency websites, this flooding will be an even more regular thing. Such things include reafforestation of the uplands and rewilding of rivers and flood plains, things the local MPs, Rory Stewart and Tim Farron, have campaigned against at the behest of local farmers. I can see why local farmers are complaining because they will lose livelihood but they should be compensated for this loss as it will be a damned sight cheaper to do that than to continually compensate householders for their losses.

Eventually, of course, if we carry on to the 2 deg C temperature rise and beyond, as seems likely, even with full mitigation measures these home will become uninhabitable as they will flood too often to dry out between flood events.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 09 Dec 2015, 19:18

It certainly turned out wet again - an update on my stats thoughts:

http://biffvernon.blogspot.co.uk/2015/1 ... again.html