February 10th - Flooding

Photos courtesy of Incredible Edible Todmorden

This is a photo of my daughter's town Tormorden, situated in the Calder Vale, the river has run rampant once again.  Their Victorian houses have basements that regularly flood.  She has a pump to get rid of the water but useless when the electricity goes.  West Yorkshire has been hit severely, as the rivers over reach their banks.  Karen will empty the basement of its contents once more into a skip and the council will take it away.  Roads are closed, trains not working in some places, the girls are looking forward to the schools being shut.  Always a ray of sunshine in bleak weather!

There was a time when all this water was wrapped up in snow but the warming of the atmosphere has stopped that, though colder weather and snow is predicted later on in the week.

For the first time here, I saw the fields at the back go under water on the other side of the river.  The arable land though is protected by a bank. The owl out hunting earlier this morning might find a drowned shrew or two of course.

So we had water at the back and water at the front, this is caused by the drainage pipe into the river being shut by the valve lid, which shuts automatically when the river rises  Cars drive through the water unfortunately, and there was even some lads punting down the road..

There is something magnificent in nature when its forces come into play, but then an awful lot of misery comes in on its tail.  And I can hardly forget the picture of the lifeboat, tossed like a toy on an angry sea out to rescue some idiotic stupid mug of a person who was surfing.