The very heavy rain this morning just to the north of Lowdham all came down the Cocker Beck, reached the top of some of the bridges, and spilled over. At one point Station road was 7 to 8 inches deep, and on Main Street, outside the Magna Charta, it was a similar depth.
I volunteered the services of a 500 gallon per minute pump, to put the water from Main Street onto the cricket pitch (the official flood spill area), and to put the water from Station Road back into the beck downstream of the bridges causing the overflow.
So off to the farm to collect the K2 and the 1938 Dennis trailer pump, and with the help of some locals, and some council workers, we set two lines to ground monitors, and used the slipper suction head on the 4-inch suction hose.
The pump ran well, but the flow rate was limited by the debris that the slipper collected – lots of fag ends outside the pub, as well as the normal leaf mess. The engine was barely above tickover. An hour or so saw Main Street cleared, and another hour on Station Road.
Anyway, everything worked, although the engine ran rather hot as the debris clogged the water takeoff to cool the engine!
Look out on East Midlands Today on BBC1 tonight! If anyone has any more photos of this, please email them to me on david@lowdhamstation.me.uk
Off to Staveley Armed Forces and Veterans Association weekend event near Chesterfield tomorrow.
Here is a link to a video made by a local resident.
Excellent work!
Dear Sir
My Auntie Barbara lives in Willow Holt and I was over with her this past weekend and we were so worried about the imminent flooding. We were so very grateful to you for pumping out the Beck and saving those properties from flooding. I don’t know what is going to happen over the next 10 days with all the rain and if it does flood again I will be on the next plane over from New York to help out. I just wanted to thank you for what you did. If only there were more good citizens and good samaritans like you. Thank you for your help.
Best wishes
Lindsey