For a few weeks in February 2014 our village was the centre of media attention. The Thames burst its banks and flowed through the Main Street. Life took on a surreal quality. The media descended on us, the army and the fire brigade pitched in and ev...
One of the most positive things to come out of the floods from a community point of view was a new Facebook group,called Datchet Eye. It rapidly became a key source of information about what was going on in the village and now has 2000 followers. It's an invaluable source of information about what's going on in the village and a lively forum for debate but during the floods it was absolutely indispensable. There was no other way to keep in touch with the rapidly changing situation. Without Datchet Eye we would not have known about the village meetings.
These were a strange phenomenon in terms of how rapidly we became institutionalised. It became part of the daily routine to wade through the village each evening to the Parish Offices for the daily update. It felt rather like a school assembly with the village note worthies and assorted public officials at the top table and the rest of us dutifully packed into the cheap seats. Though on second thoughts that may not be the best analogy as there was some pretty sharp and impassioned questioning from the floor.
There was a lot of self congratulation with the parish team falling over themselves to praise the army, the fire brigade and the volunteers but it was also an invaluable source of information about the state of the village's defences and some of the stuff that had gone wrong.
An interesting and much appreciated source of support for the village came from the Sikh Charity Khalsa Aid. Khalsa Aid who weighed in with 40 tonnes of sandbags for Datchet and neighbouring Wraysbury. The village worthies thanked them but rather spoiled the appreciation by referring to them as an Islamic charity.
There was a culvert under the railway the army were shoring up and, infamously, a private school on the way into Eton, Eton End School, had removed one of the bunds that was meant to keep water on the golf course because, it allegedly spoiled their view. I remember the Head jumping quickly and somewhat nervously to his feet when someone mentioned the word compensation.
Sometimes the messages were a bit incongruous. They would tell us water levels were going down and no more rain expected in one breath and then be talking about more sandbags the next.
A revealing experience going to and from one of these meetings was a dramatic change in the water level. Wading to the meeting the deepest of the water was over my thighs. Coming back barely an hour later it was hardly over my shins. It emerged the difference was they had raised the Thames Barrier down river letting the water out. This happened on a managed basis to ensure London did not flood at high tide. The exceptionally bad weather and high water table were to blame for the flooding but between the flood relief scheme protecting Windsor and Maidenhead and Management of the Thames Flood Barrier it was apparent who bears the brunt of it can be a matter of human choice. It would emerge later there had been an element of Environment Agency mismanagement in what happened to us, failure to open the right gates at the right time.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
