Perfect weather for fish.

[badgerx16]

"They said there'd be snow at Christmas, they said there'd be peace on Earth.

But instead it just kept on raining,...."

 

and raining, and raining, and raining, and raining.

 

It's bl00dy wet up here, how is it elsewhere ?

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-england-35182274

[Window Cleaner]

"They said there'd be snow at Christmas, they said there'd be peace on Earth.

But instead it just kept on raining,...."

 

and raining, and raining, and raining, and raining.

 

It's bl00dy wet up here, how is it elsewhere ?

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-england-35182274

 

 

Sunny and mild but a bit parky in the evenings. Best winter we've had for years, mind you I expect we'll have snow on the ground mid-June to make up for it.

[aintforever]

I wonder how long this will go on for before we get serious about doing something about climate change?

[Whitey Grandad]

I wonder how long this will go on for before we get serious about doing something about climate change?

 

El Niño innit.

 

When the scientists can explain that then perhaps they can start looking at global weather models.

[hutch]

I wonder how long this will go on for before we get serious about doing something about climate change?

 

It's been going on for around two billion years so it won't change any time soon.

 

We ought to be planning to cope with it rather than pretend we (and that means somebody else, not me) can prevent it from happening.

 

It's only water. The biggest problems stem from building houses out of plasterboard and cardboard and filling them with chipboard and foam furniture.

[aintforever]

It's been going on for around two billion years so it won't change any time soon.

 

We ought to be planning to cope with it rather than pretend we (and that means somebody else, not me) can prevent it from happening.

 

It's only water. The biggest problems stem from building houses out of plasterboard and cardboard and filling them with chipboard and foam furniture.

 

Saying that weather has been happening for billions of years is just a pointless statement, fact is climate change is making it more severe, it's only going to get worse and most our settlements are near or on waterways.

 

We need to plan to cope and do something serious about climate change because most of the people in the world who are effected way more severely are not in a position to cope. We are lucky that we just end up with a few people moaning about wet carpets, not dieing of starvation.

[hutch]

Your question was how long will this (flooding I assume) go on. I say it will go on forever, just as it always has in the past.

 

Despite those nasty people at Volkswagen, or whether there's a third runway at Heathrow or not.

[aintforever]

Your question was how long will this (flooding I assume) go on. I say it will go on forever, just as it always has in the past.

 

Despite those nasty people at Volkswagen, or whether there's a third runway at Heathrow or not.

 

Of course it will, but how long will we sit and watch it get worse and worse before doing anything about it?

 

There will come a point where the cost of clearing up the mess or trying to adapt will be more than the cost of changing our way of life. And that is just here where cost is measured in money, not human lives.

[Whitey Grandad]

Of course it will, but how long will we sit and watch it get worse and worse before doing anything about it?

 

There will come a point where the cost of clearing up the mess or trying to adapt will be more than the cost of changing our way of life. And that is just here where cost is measured in money, not human lives.

 

When you say 'do something about it', what exactly do you have in mind? We could cut all our carbon emissions to zero and it might not make any difference.

[whelk]

[/url]

[aintforever]

When you say 'do something about it', what exactly do you have in mind? We could cut all our carbon emissions to zero and it might not make any difference.

 

Might not, but it would make the chances of catastrophic warming less likely. Like I said, as these events happen more and more the cost will be so great that it will make investing in renewables and restricting carbon emmisions a no brainier.

[Manuel]

Is investing in flood defence money well spent? Or should we admit defeat in certain areas and move to higher ground.

[hutch]

Yes, and yes. Remember flood defences don't stop flooding, they just move it from one place to another.

[Verbal]

Is investing in flood defence money well spent? Or should we admit defeat in certain areas and move to higher ground.

 

It's a numbers game. If you have a hectare of land occupied by dozens of houses and another hectare of just one or two, you protect the former. That's despite the fact that the built-up area has reduced the capacity for flood waters to be absorbed naturally.

 

But the floods yesterday in York were caused exactly by not spending money on basic maintenance. Reports of the Ouse breaking its banks are silly - the river broke its banks in November and it's stayed that way, although at record highs. The Ouse floods annually - at least. The flooding that caught all the news attention was almost all caused by a decision by an Environmental Agency manager to lift the River Floss flood protection barrier. They did this because the barrier, which is also a pumping station maintaining water levels in the Foss at a constant, safe height, had been pumping excess water into the Ouse for weeks, and there were signs of imminent failure among pumps that had missed their maintenance dates because of funding shortages. The pumps are in the same building as the gears to lift the barrier, and with a spreading failure there was a risk, so they say, that the barrier would be locked in the down position with the pumps having failed - magnifying the effects of a flood in the city. In other words, the entire flood protection was about to fail.

 

The reasoning was this: better to flood with the barrier up than with it down. Unfortunately, it was done without any notice, so the first anyone behind the barrier knew about it was when water seeped rapidly under their doors. I wouldn't particularly want to be in the shoes of someone who had to decide to flood a medieval city. And it may turn out to have been a terrible decision. But underlying it is a tale of bad planning and poor maintenance. It shouldn't have happened.

[Batman]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3377219/Flood-victims-slam-luvvie-actor-Michael-Sheen-saying-sick-hearing-calls-Britain-s-12-billion-foreign-aid-spent-UK-weather-defences.html

[sadoldgit]

I live on the edge of Romney Marsh. As the name suggests it is a marshy area yet the rate of building new houses is going up and up. There is a plan in to build 750 new houses a couple of miles down the road. They will drain the land but the water has to go somewhere.

 

I feel for the poor people whose houses have been flooded again. We have to spend more on flood defences.

[Verbal]

I live on the edge of Romney Marsh. As the name suggests it is a marshy area yet the rate of building new houses is going up and up. There is a plan in to build 750 new houses a couple of miles down the road. They will drain the land but the water has to go somewhere.

 

I feel for the poor people whose houses have been flooded again. We have to spend more on flood defences.

 

I grew up on the edge of the Romney Marsh and the extensive systems of ditches and sea defences (some of it built during the Napoleonic wars) meant I don't recall a single bad flood. Water sat around in fields during the winter, but this was never a problem. Of course, there was no housing to speak of outside already established towns and villages (which, like Appledore and Rye for example, tend to sit on higher land), and certainly no creeping development into the marshes themselves. If that's what they're doing now, it risks compromising a flood defence system that has worked successfully for centuries.

[hutch]

The Fenland drains in East Anglia are a work of engineering genius. They will continue to work for as long as the moon orbits the earth.

[sadoldgit]

I grew up on the edge of the Romney Marsh and the extensive systems of ditches and sea defences (some of it built during the Napoleonic wars) meant I don't recall a single bad flood. Water sat around in fields during the winter, but this was never a problem. Of course, there was no housing to speak of outside already established towns and villages (which, like Appledore and Rye for example, tend to sit on higher land), and certainly no creeping development into the marshes themselves. If that's what they're doing now, it risks compromising a flood defence system that has worked successfully for centuries.

 

The development is to the SE of Ashford between the town and the marsh. The land is higher than the marsh but still very boggy and as you say the water lays in the fields in the winter and has now started to lay in the lanes as well though. I guess the water will make its way down to the Great Military Canal where it is easier to manage.

[Verbal]

The Fenland drains in East Anglia are a work of engineering genius. They will continue to work for as long as the moon orbits the earth.

 

Indeed they will. And to cope with rising sea levels in the Middle Ages Norfolk (and bits of Suffolk) luckily had disused peat pits which captured the floods. Now they're known as the Norfolk Broads. The Vale of York, which is as flat as the Romney Marsh or the Fens, has had none of this. In York itself, the worst floods until modern times (measured by human misery) always took place on the Foss, which each year inundated the largest slum in the city (now known as Hungate - a modern development which was, of course, flooded when the barrier was lifted).

 

History could teach us a thing or two...

[sadoldgit]

I have just driven past a small new development called Finberry just off the A2070. It was recently built on arable land and is surrounded by fields but for most of the year many of those fields are under water. I expect that they will eventually build on those fields as well but it is a very wet area.

[aintforever]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3377219/Flood-victims-slam-luvvie-actor-Michael-Sheen-saying-sick-hearing-calls-Britain-s-12-billion-foreign-aid-spent-UK-weather-defences.html

 

The crazy thing is that we are borrowing billions every year just to give it away as aid, so it's not even our money and will have to be paid back with interest. Having said that, at least foreign aid will save lives, not just the carpets of people who choose to live on flood plains. I would say blowing billions on new nukes or a high speed rail link is a bigger waste of money.

 

Cameron is guilty of a dereliction of duty with his cuts to the environment agency, all science points to climate change causing more of these sort of extreme weather events. If we are not going to bother seriously doing anything about climate change we should at least be preparing for the inevitable consequences, we should be investing massively in flood defences.

[Whitey Grandad]

The crazy thing is that we are borrowing billions every year just to give it away as aid, so it's not even our money and will have to be paid back with interest. Having said that, at least foreign aid will save lives, not just the carpets of people who choose to live on flood plains. I would say blowing billions on new nukes or a high speed rail link is a bigger waste of money.

 

Cameron is guilty of a dereliction of duty with his cuts to the environment agency, all science points to climate change causing more of these sort of extreme weather events. If we are not going to bother seriously doing anything about climate change we should at least be preparing for the inevitable consequences, we should be investing massively in flood defences.

 

Environment Agency spending actually up by £131m this year to £1.3bn but in general I agree with you about where the money would be better spent. I don't know why we need to pay anybody several hundred thousand pounds a year for a part-time job though.

[badgerx16]

Environment Agency spending actually up by £131m this year to £1.3bn but in general I agree with you about where the money would be better spent. I don't know why we need to pay anybody several hundred thousand pounds a year for a part-time job though.

Spending on flood defences is down 8% in 'real' terms in the last 4 years.