The East Coast of America was blanket in quiet a few feet of snow
£12.2billion pounds worth of damage was done in the UK
Road and railways were affected the most
Somerset was the worst affected county before so low lying and was flooding for nearly half a year
The damage was caused partly by floods but also by winds
exceeding hundred miles an hour and massive waves along the
coast
In some areas up to ten metres of coastline was eroded
Europe also took a battering to
with Eastern states being frozen
over and Mediterranean states
also battered by flooding
Causes
The ground was already waterlogged from the summer of 2013
A hot air mass from Mexico met a cold air mass from the Artic over East America and formed an
anticyclone witch physically move the Jetstream south which messed up the weather over the UK because
weather systems that are usually to the North of England hit us instead
Many depressions were able to form
rapidly one after another which would
charge towards Britain due to these
conditions
They could be a system of global warming
Reactions and reponses
The government of the UK pledged that they would
take action immediately to help those most affected
Many people worry that the government is not doing enough e.g.
dredging to be completed by 2015 is nowhere near finishing
Around 1.4 million houses were saved by
sea and flood defences but there many
area that still need protecting especially in
Somerset
Many people help their flooded local communities since many agencies were stretched to the limit
This included helping the elderly and help distribute sandbags etc.
The government set up an emergency panel to deal with the floods
Both the army and
navy were called in to
help with laying out
sandbags
Military trucks
were often used
to transport
sandbags
The environment agency set up
a three tier system to decide
what to save in what order
First priority was to save lives,
then houses and businesses and
then farmland
The Thames barrier saved
London from most of the
flooding
The environmental agency and the government has
pledged millions to increase the number of flood
defences and repair and strengthen existing ones
Whether this will encourage people to try and stop or slow down global warming is unknown