Frankley families count the cost of the floods
FRANKLEY families were today counting the cost after flash flooding devastated their homes.
Rotting carpets, electrical goods and other unsaved household items remained dumped on drenched front lawns on Oberon Close today after it was submerged by a wave of water.
It was the second major flood to hit the area in the last ten years.
The worst affected was the bungalow home of Michael Burns and Davina Cannings.
The couple, who are engaged, tried in vain to save as many possessions as they could as flood water from a nearby brook filled their home “in seconds”.
Ms Cannings, a 54-year-old catering assistant, said: “It was around lunchtime on Saturday and the drain outside the house was flooding. I rang the council who said they were sending someone out within two hours.
“As soon as I put the phone down all this water came through the back garden like a river. It was ferocious.”
Ms Cannings told how she and Mr Burns, a 52-year-old electrical engineer, ran out and tried unsuccessfully to put up the flood barriers out to stem the tide.
“Within a couple of seconds the house was flooded,” she said.
“I rang the fire brigade. The fridge was upside down and everything was floating. The wardrobes were inside out and our stuff was all over the place.”
Nearly all their furniture is ruined and the couple are spending their nights in sleeping bags at Davina’s daughter’s house nearby while they wait for help.
She said: “We have tried to get insurance but seven years ago the same thing happened and we’ve been told they won’t insure us until we are flood free for ten years.”
Father-of-two Artan Alla, a tiler aged 36, and his neighbour, mother-of-three Vicky Whiston, aged 23, and her partner James Heffernan, 24, were able to escape upstairs while the first floors of their homes flooded.
Mr Heffernan, a Land Rover worker, said: “The whole close was like a sink which had been plugged.”
