Clean-up under way as flood levels start falling in Shrewsbury

Businesses and residents have the task of pumping out and mopping up the damage caused by the water getting into their homes, shops, pubs and cafés.

Some are breathing a sigh of relief as the floods missed them by millimetres.

Two key routes that were closed by flooding in Shrewsbury have now been cleaned and reopened.

Shropshire Council took the opportunity to work on Smithfield Road before reopening it to traffic and it has also reopened Chester Street and Coton Hill.

Smithfield Road has been opened but with a lane closure.

In Coleham, Daryl Lloyd, his family and staff at the Cross Foxes pub were finally able to get into his flooded cellars to begin work to reopen hopefully by Saturday.

After jet washing, the cellars had to be thoroughly disinfected before engineers went in to check everything.

Daryl said: "On Wednesday we moved all the barrels and bottles up into the pub as the cellars flooded, now we are moving everything back down as quickly as possible/

"We lost the beers that were on tap - about £350 worth - and of course we have lost our takings."

"Now we are looking forward to a busy weekend. Our customers are so supportive and of course we have the Shrewsbury/Wrexham game on Sunday."

Daryl said the flooding at Coleham had got worse since the flood barriers were put in at Frankwell.

"They protected Frankwell, then Abbey Foregate, so all the water just ends up with us," he said.

"We also get the Rea Brook flooding, as everything channels here. What we need is an alleviation scheme for the brook."

Just a few hundred yards from the Cross Foxes, people at the Barnabas Church were breathing a collective sigh of relief after the water stopped rising millimetres from pouring into the church and food bank.

Simon Heys, a director of the church, said: "We put our flood plan into action on Wednesday, moving everything at leave 60 centimetres off the floor, then all we could do was wait and pray. Amazingly although the peak was about the same as when we have flooded before, it peaked a fraction below where the water has come in in the past.

"Now we have the job of moving everything back, hopefully, so that the food bank can reopen and we can have a service on Sunday. If not our service will move online. We couldn't do all this without the help and support of our volunteers."

Next door, volunteers at the historic Coleham Pumping Station were also grateful that the water stopped short of getting into the building's workshop, kitchen and toilets.

Ron Taggart, a founder member of the pumping station's Steam Trust, said while the yard had flooded, the workshop remained dry.

"We were very lucky this time," he said.

"Previous years we have marked on the wall where the flood has come. Now hopefully we have a couple of weeks of dry weather to let the river levels drop."