“If the building floods now we can forklift stuff onto the mezzanine level”
PETER RUNS A RETAIL BUSINESS THAT WAS FLOODED IN 2007 Peter: “I couldn’t believe what was happening. We’d had bits of water come in before, but it would be very shallow and just lapping at the car park. When the 2007 floods came it was a completely different story. It was horrendous going in and seeing the devastation – and I felt all on my own with it. But when the building was being re-made we put all the electrics high up in the walls and all machines were re-done with overhead power so the sockets wouldn’t get flooded. Also, if the building floods now we can forklift stuff onto the mezzanine level (which we also put in when we refurbished).” Download the PDF
“We also raised the floor level and strengthened the floor. We haven’t used flood barriers as I feel that in our location they wouldn’t work as we are so close to the brook and river, but we have made these changes to the building and that has worked out really well. We have been flooded since: one at Christmas and one at the end of January. The Christmas one came into the building 5-6 inches above the floor but we’d taken the precaution of putting pallets under the machinery. It was good that we had changed the premises in certain ways in the 6 months we were closed.”
• Given the opportunity (refurbishment, rebuilding etc.) are there any structural changes that would make your premises more flood-resilient? • Do you have any stock or raw materials that you could move to a safer place or raise off the ground?