As someone pointed out to me the other day when I commented on the weather being quite good, the 1947 freeze didn't start until the end of January and didn't finish until mid March, by which time according to that fountain of all knowledge, Wikipedia, there were food shortages, fuel shortages and then when this was followed by flooding, 25% of sheep stock lost.
The USA has recently had it's own Polar Vortex and quite honestly how some of the people and animals survived I do not know. Which makes me think what would happen if something similar happened to us. In 1947 when flooded out, people just moved upstairs and got on with it, coming down when the water went (most of them with no help from insurance companies) and cleared the house out. Following heavy snow and ice in the previous months they must have thought a plague would be next.
This village has flooded quite badly in the past, water up to the upstairs window ledges I am told in some parts. The worst I've seen it is up to the cemetery so the only way out was through Gringley, Gainsborough; you could get as far as halfway down past the roundabout and then land all around flooded, partly due to the fact that the powers to be wouldn't let Gainsborough flood..
Which leads me on to our village Emergency Plan, which I am told we
have, although done some years ago. Has it been updated? Who is in
charge and more to the point are they any good and what support do they have? Doom and gloom I know but since most of us have, or should have, an emergency plan in their home, the one for our village should be watertight. Where do we go if there is a disaster. It might not be flooding or just bad weather, we've a petrol dump on our doorstep and planes flying over us at night from Finningley. It might be something as simple as somebody nicking our gas and electricity and causing an explosion.
At the time we were asked what we had that could be useful in an emergency. Things change, is it about time our parish council should get its bum into gear and start thinking about what could happen before it happens and get things updated. Whose got a room spare at the Inn if the unthinkable happens. What do we need, bit like your holiday list - Tickets, passport, money and knickers, beggar the rest if you leave it behind. More to the point, where do we go if we have to evacuate in a hurry. It will make a change for something useful to be popped through our letter box
Doom and gloom, well yes, but you never know. Whose for a rehearsal?
Most of the Parish Council live furthest away from any risk of flooding so I don't think the majority care. It's the policy of 'I'm all-right jack, sod the others syndrome'.
ReplyDeleteYes the emergency plan was done by the previous council a few years ago. A list was compiled of available help and tools such as who was physically able to do things and plant tools such as generators.shovels,pumps, 4 wheel drive vehicles etc,
I have only heard about some people who volunteered to clear snow and that does not happen in this area very often. It takes someone from out of the 'village' to make this Parish Council aware of a potential hazard at the old factory site, so what chance have the Misterton villagers got in an emergency. Seems to me it will be a case of 'the blind leading the blind.
'.