The jet stream piled weather fronts across the UK this week causing daily fluctuations in the number of flood warnings. Although for some the risk seems remote there are 5.9m properties in flood-prone zones in England alone, according to the Environment Agency.
But it is not only homes that face damage. Lots of historic sites and wildlife are equally at risk, especially as climate change makes rainfall bursts heavier. Increasingly it takes a major cooperative effort to stop even a small river becoming a destructive force.
An example is the scenic River Skell in Yorkshire, only 12 miles long with Fountains Abbey on its banks and Ripon at its lower end as it reaches the River Ure. The Skell flooded badly in 2007 and again in 2020, damaging the abbey and homes in Ripon.
It has taken 16 organisations, including the National Trust, and money from the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the European Union to come together in the Skell Valley Project to provide a blueprint on how to turn a river from a threat into a haven for wildlife, safeguard for heritage and visitor attraction.
Restoring the river, protecting its banks, creating ponds and clearing silt has increased its beauty and its heritage value, as well as holding back dangerous flood water.
