Boss Radio

So this lady leaves her car, quite legitimately, in a car park. The park is on a hillock, and she parks it near the top.

The floods come.

When she returns her car is untouched, but unreachable as the water around it is waist deep. She decides that not only is it pointless getting to the car since she couldn't drive it out, but that it is probably dangerous as well, there's quite a current in that water.

The following day she returns to see if the floods have gone down. They haven't, but on her car she can now see a parking ticket.

Someone has waded through that waist deep water for the sole purpose of ticketing a car that obviously can't be moved.

I wouldn't have waded through that water even if the car deserved to be ticketed. You do have to wonder what goes through the minds of some people sometimes.

I guess it's anything for a bonus.

They underestimated by 24 hours. The surge hit us last night. Of course, when I say "Us", I mean 'them'. We're still home free and dry as an Ausie's armpit. The news is full of acts of bravery, heroism, and people being just plain nice to each other, so it almost seems churlish to rain (No pun intended) upon anyone's parade, but...

Vandals have been having a gay old time in abandoned houses, 'Anti-looting' wardens are scouring the streets, people in big cars are driving through flooded areas 'because they can', with no consideration for what the wash they're causing might do, and - live on TV - a reporter got her bum fondled.

Yes indeed. There she was, telling us all about the sudden arrival of the 'Look out. The floods are coming!' police on this small community, and up creeps this weird guy with a Mona Lisa grin. As he passes the reporter he leans a little to the left, down shoots his hand, one backside fondled before a shocked nation and he's off.

Having been filmed and watched by millions of viewers I suppose if he ever does get picked up and charged he'll simply claim that he can't get a fair trial because there aren't enough people who didn't see the event to form a jury.

Meanwhile the water's getting a little too close for comfort. All these pictures were taken fairly close to where we live, and there's been more rain threatened, although, to be fair, the Channel 5 weather girl did say that the rain that was coming wouldn't normally be a problem, it's just that it's going to mingle with what's already down here.

I feel better already.

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Today's pics © Dave Hart, Carl de Souza/AFPGetty Images, Matt Bullock, & the BBC.

It was a great evening.

Yesterday there was scarcely a cloud in the sky as I stood at the back door watching the sun slowly head east and listened to the radio.

On the radio a guy was standing on a bridge not a mile from here and watching the river. We're expecting a surge, which probably means 'flood', and even though we knew it wasn't about to happen yet, the guy said he'd swear that he could see the water rising. Someone else called in and said that a tributary of the river ran past the bottom of his garden and it was already a foot up his summerhouse. Why weren't they mentioning the tributaries? The presenter said he thought they were, but if they weren't he'd make sure that they did, but meanwhile the next town downstream had been flooded. Another tributary had burst its banks and they had unexpectedly copped it before we did.

Time for a guilty sigh of relief. Their misfortune meant that pressure on the river up at our end would be relieved, temporarily.

Watching that sunset and gazing at the bone dry gardens whilst basking in the still warm sunlight, it seemed impossible that we were almost entirely cut off from the world outside.There must be some mistake.

Yet still the radio went on. The local football stadium had been commandeered for the up to 1,500 people expected to be displaced by the overnight flooding. The railway lines to London were currently still open but were expected to be closed by morning. A motorway was grinding to a standstill. The by-pass had been brought to a halt. One by one local schools were announcing that they would not be open tomorrow. The list of streets affected by floodwater continued to rise, and I was starting to recognise the names of some of them. It was a little like election night when your party is taking a pasting, every now and then a road would be declared free from water and a little cheer would go up as your lot finally gained a seat.

This morning the truth was revealed. Most of the southern half of Britiain was underwater. Two weeks ago most of the northern half was similarly afflicted. I almost feel guilty for not being a part of it. Meanwhile the natives are getting restless. They want to know why weren't we warned? Why isn't more being done? Where are the people who fix these problems?

Well in answer to question one, we were. I heard the weather forecast 36 hours before the rains came warning that southern England was about to be hit by a month's worth of rain in just a few hours, which would inevitably mean flooding. A day earlier a flyer had dropped though my door from the local council. It was about what to do in case of a disaster. I didn't read it. I wonder how many other people who are now complaining of being unprepared simply ignored the weather forcast and the flyer, just like me? I guess I just got lucky.

As for doing more about it. Until 'it' happens who knows what is going to happen and where? If the authorities were to be ready for everything that could ever possibly happen anywhere in the country the tax bill would be... beyond my abilities to calculate.

And for the final irony, the people who fix these problems are themselves caught up in it.

I'm not trying to say there's nothing that can or should be done, but the point is that there was no way of knowing that the jet stream was going to detour south, it's supposedly a once in a lifetime thing, but we're now told that we have to expect extreme events more frequently so it's now time for the government to come up with a long term strategy to deal with future events, but let's not take them to task for not being prepared for something that we only had one and a half days notice of.
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When we first moved into this area my parents apparently checked out a house on an island in the river. A local asked them if they had kids. They confirmed that they did, in fact, have three. He told them not to buy the house because they'd never have a moments peace for wondering if the river had got their kids whenever one of us disappeared. The blue door on the right is one of the houses near where we would have moved. The view would have been great, that's it on the left (If I've formatted this correctly...) but a caller to the radio programme said that the water was just starting to lap over the edge of the island.

I guess I got lucky again...

All these pictures were taken by local residents and sent to the BBC for display upon its news pages. The photogs were...




Daniel Messer, Lou Hannan, 'Steve & Karen', Alan Miles, Phil Armstrong, Mark Wadley, Paul Hughes, Bob Bradley, Andrew Roland, Mark McArthur-Christie, Alison Nicholson, Karen McCallum, Michael Green, Chris Farmer, & inevitably... Anon.