Severe flooding prompts evacuations as Storm Desmond sweeps across UK
LONDON. KAZINFORM - Homes and roads were flooded across northern England and Scotland on Saturday and people were forced to evacuate their homes as Storm Desmond triggered widespread chaos, The Guardian reports.
The river Eden burst its banks at Appleby-in-Westmorland, Cumbria, leaving some properties under a metre of water. Around 180 families were forced to seek shelter at Appleby grammar school as Cumbria police declared a major incident in the region. The village of Braithwaite was left "isolated" after the flooded river swept away the main bridge connecting it to the rest of the county. Geoff Mawdsley, owner of the Coledale Inn, where many locals were seeking refuge for the night, described a "raging torrent going into the village" and said that a wall of the Coledale High Bridge had "gone". Rain continued to fall overnight in Scotland, northern England and northern parts of Wales, and was likely to continue for a few hours yet, forecasters said. The Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron was among those stranded in the storm. He was driving through his Westmorland and Lonsdale constituency with a carload of four children when he got stuck on a heavily flooded back road. Full story