Flooding hit Shropshire homes months before end of £900k drain work

Wellington Road in Muxton frequently floods, and on Sunday an inch and a half of rain made the area impassable.

Residents said water was running through their houses, while vehicles were unable to make their way through the street.

Groundwork for ‘crucial’ £900,000 work to the sewers in Wellington Road started in March this year, and is expected to stop flooding once its completed late in August.

The work follows years of complaints about bad smells in hot weather and flash floods after heavy rainfall.

It comes after flooding across the county on Sunday, including at Albrighton where areas of the village had to be locked down for safety reasons.

Jonathan Smith, of Severn Trent Water, said: “The extreme rainfall on Sunday put huge pressure on the council’s highway drains which then lead to our sewers.

“We’ve investigated the issue in Albrighton and found that our pumping station, while operating at a much increased capacity, was working as it should.

“In Muxton, we already have plans to increase the capacity of our sewers in the area to help cope with increased levels of rainfall in the future.”

Mr Smith also offered advice to those who have flooding in their homes.

“If anyone has flooding at their home they should check to see if it’s rainwater or sewage that’s coming from an overflowing sewer, possibly through a manhole cover in the garden or outside your home,” he said.

“If it’s just rainwater, the flooding should subside when it stops raining, although it can take up to four hours for water to drain away, so be patient.

"Where sewage is escaping this is obviously a priority for us, so please call us.”

Severn Trent can be contacted on 0800 783 4444.

Russell Griffin, of Telford & Wrekin Council, said: “With the emergency services fully deployed across the West Midlands, the council’s out-of-hours officers responded to numerous calls of flooding, delivering sandbags to affected properties.

“In most cases both the highway gullies and receiving drainage network simply did not have the capacity to deal with this storm – many highways were flooded, but drained away once the storm passed.

“Where flooding persisted, the council is working in partnership with other agencies to investigate the cause of these issues.”

The thunderstorms on Sunday caused tens of thousands of pounds of damage as water rose to waist level in some places, swamping homes and businesses.

A man in his 80s died in Walsall after getting trapped in his submerged car.

Passers-by fought in vain to save him, diving to the car and attempting to smash the glass, but he was confirmed dead in hospital.

Roads including the M54, A41 and A5 were all disrupted until Monday.