Amid public anger, Britain sends military to help flooded region

[unhappycamper]

http://www.latimes.com/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-britain-flooding-military-20140130,0,3305590.story



Firefighters attempt to move a pump on a flooded road near the village of Long Load in Somerset, southwest England.

Amid public anger, Britain sends military to help flooded region
By Henry Chu
January 30, 2014, 10:00 a.m.

LONDON -- Amid rising anger from local residents and forecasts of more rain, the British government sent military officials to southwest England on Thursday to help deal with floodwaters that have turned whole villages into islands and drowned parts of the country's storybook countryside.

Some rural communities in the county of Somerset have been cut off for weeks by the flooding, the result of storms that have lashed Britain almost nonstop since Christmas. The freak weather is linked to the harsh snowstorms in the United States, where cold fronts have collided with warm fronts in the South and strengthened the jet stream across the Atlantic, stirring a cauldron of precipitation.

Parts of southern England have suffered their wettest January since records started being kept a century ago. More storms are predicted for this weekend and into early February, and flood warnings have been issued for more than two dozen areas.

Up to 45 square miles of the Somerset Levels, a flat expanse near the city of Bristol, lie swamped beneath a plain of muddy brown water. British media have broadcast aerial footage of car roofs and hedges barely visible above the water’s surface.

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. January was England's wettest winter month in almost 250 years

The deluge that has engulfed southern and central England in recent weeks is the worst winter downpour in almost 250 years, according to figures from the world's longest-running weather station.

The rainfall measured at the historic Radcliffe Meteorological Station at Oxford University in January was greater than for any winter month since daily recording began there in 1767, and three times the average amount.

The latest Met Office data shows that the region from Devon to Kent and up into the Midlands suffered its wettest January since its records began in 1910.

But Ian Ashpole, the Radcliffe Meteorological Observer, said: "The Radcliffe measurements more than double the length of the Met Office record and give us a better grip on how things are changing."

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/feb/01/january-uk-wettest-winter-month-250-years