Force of the storm

THIRTY years ago this weekend, Ealing suffered its worst storm for nearly 300 years.

The Great Storm of October 15-16 1987, when winds reached almost 100mph, brought 5,000 trees crashing down in the borough.

For more than a century, Ealing had been considered to be the capital’s most leafy borough. Its tree-lined streets and areas of parkland led to the accolade Queen of the Suburbs.

In the wake of the hurricane, residents launched a huge tree replacement scheme and, by April 1989, had planted 5,400 new trees.

On the night of the storm, up to one in three homes in west London were damaged. Hospitals, schools and offices reported much structural damage.

Eighty out of 90 schools in the Ealing borough had either trees down or structural damage to buildings.

Dormers Wells High School lost part of its kitchen roof. At Downe Manor First and Middle School, a large tree crashed down on a classroom, while at Ealing College, Greenwood First and Middle, and Our Lady of Visitation, there was extensive damage.

Coffin bearers in Bernard Road, Ealing, had to pick their way through trees as one family proceeded with the funeral of a loved one.

Elsewhere in the borough, wartime shrapnel was found embedded in upturned trees and this timber could not be sold to merchants.

Across London London, more than 600 trees were brought down on London Underground tracks.

On October 16 1987, the London Fire Brigade dealt with 4,000 calls in just a few hours, creating a pressure that was without precedent in peacetime.

London’s 6,800 firefighters fr from the 114 stations across London rescued people trapped in buildings, attended scenes where trees had fallen on cars and climbed roofs to take down chimneys, which were about to collapse after being loosened by th the furious winds.

The brigade’s problems were made worse at 4.23am when a power cut blacked out all three mobilising control rooms and th the central operations room at L Lambeth HQ.

Generators came into operati tion, but teleprinter links to fire st stations were not working in all b but one of the control rooms, so ra radio telephones had to be used fo for several hours until the electr tricity was restored.

For many the Great Storm will b be remembered for the Met Office’s weather forecast the day before when Michael Fish fa famously told TV viewers not to worry, there was no hurricane on th the way.

Mr Fish said that a woman had ru rung the BBC to enquire about a major storm approaching as her son was due to go camping and h he could reassure her.

The woman is said to have made the call from Pinner.

The rest is history. Across the south-east, 15 million trees were felled and as much as £3 billion of damage was caused.

Nineteen people lost their lives.