Villagers in an Aberdeenshire community brought to its knees by Storm Frank called for flood sirens to prepare them against any future devastation last night.
About 200 people gathered at Ballater’s Victoria and Albert Halls as the community discussed the on-going recovery of the village more than a month after the River Dee burst its banks and forced hundreds out of their homes and businesses on December 30.
The flood information meeting was chaired by councillor Peter Argyle and included representatives from the police and fire and rescue services, the Scottish Flood Forum, Aberdeenshire Council and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa).
And locals grilled the panel of experts about what was being done to protect the community from future flooding events – with some questioning why Sepa did not warn them of the danger sooner.
Last night it was revealed that 307 homes and 60 businesses in Ballater alone were hit by the floods.
Local businessman Alistair Cassie said: “Obviously time is an important factor. Do you think to bring back a siren to give warning to people and the general public would be effective?
“It would really give people in Ballater considerable time to get organised. There must be some benefit. It is not everyone that has smartphones and can get a message from Sepa.”
Ballater sergeant, Steve Robertson, said the force was looking at all options.
He added: “I think that will be part of the community plan in terms of looking at ways we can get the message out there. The fundamental message of having a community warning out there is important.”
He added in more than 20 years of policing it had been his “most challenging day of work”.
Sepa hydrologist, Claire Wheeler, said: “I don’t think we envisaged quite what a severe event this was going to be.
“It was a very intense event. A huge amount of rainfall affected the area off the back of conditions that had saturated the ground.”
However one local man said: “Why was it we didn’t get a warning on the TV, the radio, the media, anything like that?
“It would have given people a chance to get children to safety. You should have given us a warning at 6pm-7pm the night before it happened. We got woken up by an automated call.
“If we are going to get a warning lets get a proper warning.”
Aberdeenshire Council’s Marr area manager Janelle Clark updated residents on the local recovery plan, adding the aim was to “get Ballater back to where it was before the flooding”.
