Worst November weather on record for UK

The month of November 2009 will live long in the memory of many for years to come as it was the wettest since records had begun. Floods devastated parts of Cumbria with damage costs set to be in the million of pounds. The town of Cockermouth was the worst affected area as rivers burst their banks and bridges collapsed leaving town folk stuck and having to be saved by rescue services.

The UK average rainfall for November reached 217.4mm, which far outweighed the previous of 193.6mm in 1951 according to the Met Office. The highest amount of rainfall was found unsurprisingly in the Cumbrian area of Shap. Here they recorded 621.4mm, which was almost three times the national average. Thousands of people were forced into leaving their homes behind in search of safety and one man died. PC Bill Barker was directing traffic to safety when a bridge collapsed sweeping him away.

A spokesman for the Met Office said that all though all previous rainfall records were broke the strangest thing was how isolated the heavy rain was. Places like Cumbria and Snowdonia were the worst affected area while many places in the east of the country had little more than 100mm of rain, which brought the national average down.

In Cumbria the cleanup is still ongoing and it expected that many residents still will not be able to return to their houses for a while. Army forces have been drafted in to help with the situation and have built a foot bridge to connect the two parts of Workington that were separated when a bridge collapsed.