Emergency Response Team For Bournemouth

Bournemouth Council is linking up with its local authority partners to form a group that will help to shape emergency responses in the wake of the August 18th flash floods.

The Task and Finish group will comprise of local councillors and representatives of the Environment Agency, Wessex Water and the Emergency services. The group will focus on areas of improvement and changes to Council procedures to help develop and improve local service responses to future flood situations.

Roads were damaged during the heavy rain

Councillors John Adams, Mark Anderson, Robert Lawson, Michael Weinhonig and Roger West will represent the Council on the group. The proactive approach to form the group was taken in light of floods that saw Bournemouth experience a month's worth of rainfall in a single day.

Councillor Robert Lawton, Bournemouth Council's Portfolio Holder for Transport and Environment, said:

"The council admires the superb team spirit and professionalism displayed by all our employees and partner agencies during the Bournemouth flash floods incident. Special mention must go to Wessex Water who manned all the pumps to ensure that the Air Festival, beaches and large areas of the town were quickly cleaned up following the floods.

"However, we are keen to ensure that we learn lessons from this incident in order to best prepare ourselves for any future flooding situations. The Task and Finish Group has been set up to make recommendations for improvements and changes to the Council to assist any future response."

The gardens were completely flooded