Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
‘WE LOST EVERYTHING AS SEWAGE POURED IN’
A couple have lost everything after their flat was flooded with water from their toilet, plugholes and nearby drains as the sewer network was overwhelmed by “once-in-50-year rainfall”.
Tony King and Frances Spanner woke up on Sunday morning to find their basement apartment in Central Parade, Herne Bay, submerged.
The water appeared to be finally seeping out of their flat by 7am – until more murky liquid gushed in from the overflowing drains outside.
Mr King, 34, told the Gazette: “There was a plop, plop, plop sound and all the water came up the drains and flooded into the flat.
“At that point, we were thinking ‘we’re going to lose everything here’.
“We were using cat litter, towels, bedsheets, everything to try to absorb it. But it got to a stage where we thought we had to get out.
“It was coming from the inside as well eventually. The toilets were backing up and water was coming up through the shower, so you know it was sewage. It stunk. It was disgusting.”
Southern Water says its network of pipes in Herne Bay were filled to capacity by the deluge early on Sunday morning.
The soon-to-be-married pair were offered a one-night stay by Southern Water, which runs wastewater services across Kent, but instead opted to try to dry out their flat.
Their sofa, bed, washing machine, oven, shoes and kitchen cupboards were all destroyed during the ordeal.
And to make matters worse, they say they were unable to secure insurance cover for their property after a similar incident four years ago.
“We opened up the back door and saw all our belongings floating out,” Mr King continued.
“We don’t know how we’re going to replace everything. We don’t know what we’re going to.
“I had sentimental things like pictures of my kids, but they’re all gone. We’ve got no way of cooking and we’ve got no way of cleaning our clothes. It’s devastating.
“The whole place needs redecorating – it looks like a tornado has hit it.
“We have no choice but to stay in our flat, but we can’t find anyone to look after our cats and we can’t leave them there alone.
“From what I know almost everyone along the street was affected.”
Fire crews started to receive calls from locals along the seafront and in the centre of town at 6.30am, with the most serious incident requiring the removal of about 200,000 litres of liquid.
Mortimer Street resident Tanya Ryder says her home, along with a number of others in the town, was also hit by the floods.
The 46-year-old is hoping, in conjunction with more locals, to launch legal action against Southern Water.
Bosses at seafront ice cream shop Scoops believe the deluge has left them £10,000 out of pocket, as the business closed for two days and was forced to throw away stock and equipment.
Bill Cain, whose family runs the eatery, says staff had been working since 8am to try to clear about three feet of water from the premises.
“We’ve lost a lot of the ice cream in the basement, a lot of the stock, storage freezers, two days’ trade - and our staff lost their wages,” he explained.
“We pumped it out ourselves, with a lot of help from the local businesses. We had to wait for everything to dry out, throw everything away and have a complete clean-up.
“A lot of the basements here were flooded. Our neighbours have had their homes flooded and their belongings damaged - it’s really quite bad.”
Wetherspoon has also confirmed that water seeped through the front of its Saxon Shore pub in Central Parade.
Part of Sea Street, close to the junction with Hampton Pier Avenue, was also submerged.
Meanwhile, commuters had to wade through knee-high water in the underpass at Herne Bay railway station.
Town centre councillor Andrew Cook woke up at about 6am to find “a river running past” his house in Station Road as the rain pelted down.
“This only happens about once every six or so years,” the Tory added.
“It was a hello fa lot of rain in a very short period of time.
“There were places where the water would have come halfway up your calf.
“It did disperse reasonably quickly, so at about 9am it had actually cleared.”
The flooding also caused disruption on the railway lines, with trains heading towards
London unable to call at Herne Bay until 10.10am.
A Kent County Council spokeswoman says the authority briefly closed Sea Street and provided flood sacks as a precaution to a handful of properties in Hanover Street.
She estimates that the downpour saw as much as two inches of rain fall in parts of the Garden of England.
Southern Water claims an internal probe has revealed the submerged properties were affected by a combination “of surface-water flooding and internal flooding”, as the sewer system became “overwhelmed by the extreme rainfall”.
“Our analysis shows this was a once-in-50-year rainfall event,” he insisted.
“Levels in some areas were so high the sewers were full and backed up.
“We continue to investigate, but storm pumps may have failed to start up initially.
“However, sewers received up to 10 times the amount of water they normally carry and are designed to take.
“With the entire catchment overwhelmed by such huge levels of surface water entering the drains, it is not yet known if internal flooding could have been avoided.”