Flooding Fierce Earth

Today on Fierce Earth, we look at the awesome power of flooding

and find out what happens when it rains too much

and water suddenly becomes our enemy.

It can play havoc with people's lives.

I had no idea that water could do so much damage.

It was something I would never want to go through again.

A tiny amount can sweep you off your feet.

It's the force of the water,

you're fighting for your life in no time.

And we discover new technology that can save your life.

The Fierce Earth team investigate why floods occur,

and learn how best to survive them.

What happens when the ground shakes, the seas rise up,

and the air tears itself apart?

The Fierce Earth team move in,

taking on the most powerful forces on the planet.

Get ready for Fierce Earth - the Earth and how to survive it.

Water is one of nature's most important gifts.

It covers more than 70% of the Earth

and is vital to all forms of life.

Rainwater plays a big role in the Earth's weather system.

Most importantly for humans and animals,

rain provides water to drink.

But when there is too much water,

or a lot of water in the wrong place, it can cause flooding.

Have you ever watered a plant?

A little water will soak the soil,

too much and it will rise out and over the top.

The soil in this pot is like our Earth.

It can soak up a little bit of water, but it cannot hold too much.

When it rains really heavily,

there is only one place for the water to go, up and out.

Well, that's what happens in a flood.

And there has never been more flooding around than at the moment.

2012 was one of England's wettest, most soggiest years on record.

This is set to be the wettest April in 100 years.

The torrential rain caused chaos

and flooding across some parts of the country.

Leading to almost 8,000 properties being flooded.

Railway lines were closed leaving people with no way to get home.

'Thousands of rail passengers were left stranded,

'every single river in this county is now on flood alert.'

Flooding has never been more of an issue,

but what is it actually caused by?

There are a few different types of flooding.

One is river flooding.

When a river can't cope with the amount of rainfall

and it overflows, spilling out onto the land.

Surface or flash flooding happens when there is heavy rainfall

in a short amount of time and the land cannot hold any more water.

This type of flooding also happens in towns or cities

when drainage systems overflow.

So what's it like to be caught in a flash flood?

I have been told that as little as 25 centimetres of water is enough

to knock you off your feet.

But normally that amount of still water only reaches up to

an adult's knee, and it's possible to walk through.

The problem is not the amount of water,

it's the speed it travels.

When it's fast-flowing water, it can become super-powerful

and may be deadly.

My Fierce Earth challenge today is to experience what it's like to

be caught in a flash flood.

And to see if just 25 centimetres of fast-flowing water

can knock me off my feet.

I know all about life on the edge.

I've climbed to the top of the world's highest mountain.

Frozen in the Antarctic.

And parachuted off the planet's biggest cliffs.

What I'm about to do is very dangerous.

On hand is one of the UK's leading flood safety trainers.

I have been doing swift water rescue training

for the last seven years full-time.

Leo has definitely been thrown in at the deep end today.

Any tips you can give me?

If you can put one foot forward, and lean into the flow,

that's going to give you an advantage.

Then think about trying to minimise your surface area.

So there's less area for the water to push on?

The important thing is once you get washed away,

not to try and stand up.

What you want to be doing is rolling onto your back,

feet downstream and try to remain as calm as possible.

Easier said than done.

And it's all about, it's just about trying to control yourself really.

Controlling your breathing and trying to stay calm

as well as controlling your body position in the water.

-Try not to drink too much of the river.

-Yeah, top tip.

'Sounds straightforward, but I'm still scared.

'Good job I'm wearing a fully protected dry suit

'and safety helmet and there are five emergency trained

'experts on hand to pull me out of the water if anything goes wrong.'

OK, release the water on the long course.

Release the hounds! Agh!

It's not too bad right now, but I can see it coming. Look at that.

That's starting to feel heavy, it feels like you've got lead boots on.

My heart is really beating fast. It's quite intense.

'I am well out of my comfort zone here,

'and I'm about to get out of my depth.'

It's not even at my knees yet and I can barely stand up.

Oh, my goodness, look at that. I'm going. I'm going.

I can't stand up any more!

I can't...

'I managed to face the power of the fast flowing water

'for one minute, 29 seconds.

'And the level reached up to just below my knee,

'roughly 25 centimetres.

'I've just felt the equivalent force

'of 90 buses hitting me at once, it was full on.

'The power of this rushing water is sweeping me down the river.

'If this is a pretend experience, it's scary enough.

'I can't imagine what it would be like for real.

'Any minute now I could hit floating debris

'and, as advised, I am travelling on my back and I'm powerless.

'It's just me versus the water.'

Oh, my goodness.

Quite tiring.

It is not the depth, it's the force of the water and you just,

you're fighting for your life in no time.

'That was scary.

'I've taken on the power of water.

'It knocked me off my feet in one minute 29 seconds.

'The water that hit me every second weighed 14 tonnes.

'That's the equivalent weight of about 90 double-decker buses.

'On this occasion the water won.

It's dangerous, you need to treat it with respect

and try and stay out of the way.

In this controlled exercise, Leo fell victim

to the extreme power of water

and found out how easy it is to be washed away by its mighty force.

So floods can be seriously dangerous, but because they destroy

and damage so much, they can also be very expensive.

The top three most costly floods to hit the UK are:

In third position, in 2012 the UK

had one of its wettest summers ever.

Over 1,000 flood alerts were issued.

Filthy water ruined more than 8,000 homes.

The cost is £400 million and counting.

In second position, in the year 2000,

flooding hit the areas of Shrewsbury, Lewes

and Portsmouth ruining over 10,000 buildings and costing £1 billion.

And the worst, the summer floods of 2007 which destroyed

over 55,000 properties and cost a total of £3.2 billion

with the worst affected areas being in Sheffield and Hull.

Next I travel to Boscastle in Cornwall

and meet a teenager who found herself in the middle of one

of the most severe flash floods Britain has ever seen.

In August 2004, Boscastle suffered enormous

damage as a wall of water swept through this small village.

It was a nightmare for the people who live there causing

large-scale devastation.

And costing around £50 million to repair the damage.

So, what turned this picturesque village into what can only be

described as a swirling torrent of water and debris?

The answer is that a month's worth of rain fell in just four hours

and the water rushed through this narrow valley.

That day, 20 centimetres of rain fell in a four-hour period

and two million tonnes of it surged through this village centre.

How did it feel to watch this disaster unfold?

To find out, I am here in Boscastle to meet Julie Moffat.

Julie was just 13 at the time these terrifying floods happened.

Her story made the national news.

That was one of the restaurants, they called it the Blue Room.

But no-one wants to be a celebrity for reasons like these.

This is my bedroom, and my bed was in the far corner over there.

We still can't live here because of the damp.

Julie is a few years old now,

and all the flood damage to their property is repaired.

So this is where the water came in?

Yes, we actually have a flood level just up here.

Gosh, that is so high.

How high the water came up.

There's not much evidence left of the floods now,

but Julie still has strong memories of the disaster.

Tell me about the day of the floods?

In the afternoon it started to rain

and it was really, really heavy rain.

A black cloud and it was quite surreal really,

the weather changed that quick.

Water started rushing through the streets, so Julie and her mum headed

to what they thought would be safety, their family business and home.

We all just basically went into the Manor House

and stuffed coats and stuff like that under the door

to try and stop it because we didn't think

it was going to be anything major.

But things were actually getting major very quickly.

We realised it was getting more serious probably

when the water started to come into the Manor House through

the door barricade that we had made.

That's when we realised how powerful that water was to push it away.

This flood water was sweeping away everything in its path,

including a number of empty parked cars and vehicles.

It was going really fast, actually.

It picked up all the cars.

They were just being chucked down the village.

Just... It was the most surreal thing I've ever seen, I think.

Just imagine all of this water rushing through your home.

I saw how high the water was coming outside the Manor House, and

that's when we had a look downstairs and there was a lot of water.

The water was probably up to my chest at the time.

At one point we could see my auntie's

and my nan's cars both being chucked down the village.

That water was just so powerful it was able to do that as

if they didn't weigh anything at all.

Julie was trapped in her home

and all she could do was watch with horror through the window.

We were up in the Manor House for five or six hours just waiting

really for something to happen, we didn't know what to do.

With so much water tearing through the streets,

there was only one way many of the villagers could be rescued.

By helicopter.

Looking out of the window we could see people being

rescued at the time, being winched up by helicopters.

Standing on their roofs, trying to get attention to be rescued.

It was really quite scary seeing them frightened like that.

Julie and her mum were waiting for their turn to be winched away,

but they had no idea when this would happen.

We had no communication, all the phone lines were down.

It was quite scary not knowing what was happening.

Dozens of people were dramatically winched into the RAF helicopters.

But with water levels falling,

Julie decided to take a different route to safety.

We decided to make a run for it.

The water was about up to my chest at the time.

When it was down quite a lot, we decided to wade through it.

The flood was over, both Julie and her mum had escaped to safety,

but the village they called home was devastated.

I had no idea that water could do so much damage before.

You know, you see it on TV,

but it doesn't hit home until you are seeing it right in front of you.

It was something I would never want to go through again.

There was going to be a lot of cleaning up for Julie's family

and the village to do.

But thanks to the amazing work of the emergency services,

150 villagers were rescued and no lives were lost on that day.

Floods have continued to hit the UK since Boscastle in 2004.

And they have proved to be a huge challenge to our emergency services.

That's because flood victims haven't just been trapped in their homes...

NEWS REPORT: Heavy rain and powerful winds have caused flooding

and disruption across much of the United Kingdom...

Drivers have been left stranded...

One man has died in flood waters in Somerset...

One of the toughest jobs for emergency services during severe

floods is to rescue people who had got stuck in their cars.

Many believe they are safer to stay in their vehicle.

But be warned, it doesn't take much water

to lift a car from the ground and sweep it away.

So emergency rescue teams have made it their priority to come up

with a safe way of rescuing people.

Leo and I are about to find out how the emergency services are learning

new techniques for rescuing people trapped in their cars by floods.

Matt is a safety expert in flood rescue.

Today, he's going to show me how quickly a car can get flooded.

And he's going to show me how to perform a rescue.

Nearly half of flood-related deaths happened to people in vehicles,

so it's quite important to know how to get out.

And it only takes two feet of water to actually wash away a car.

As I've already learned, rushing water is dangerous.

So I'm going to be trained about the safest way to move

through powerful water.

This pole allows me to check for uneven ground and helps me

to stay on my feet.

And Zoe gets the chance to watch me practice

before she gets into the car.

Just watching this demo, I am absolutely terrified already.

My heart's racing.

I'm being supported by the rescue team and we're using each other

to stop ourselves from falling in to the water.

As a group, we are stronger

and have more chance of standing up than a lone individual.

Think, eight legs are stronger than two.

It's way harder than it looks.

The skill is moving together to create a human shield

against the water.

Seeing it rushing down this channel, yeah,

it's making me feel quite sick, actually.

It's exhausting.

Facing the awesome power of this water,

travelling at ten tonnes per second.

That's the equivalent of a whopping 10,000 litres of water.

No wonder Zoe is feeling sick. This is really scary and dangerous.

Right, I think they're ready for me. Wish me luck!

I am about to find out what it's like to be trapped

in a car during a flood.

Because it doesn't take much water to move a car,

this one has been chained down so that I don't get swept away.

To understand the force of the water about to hit Zoe's car,

think how hard you would find it to shut a door on your own

-with 100 of your friends pushing against you.

-I'm terrified already.

But it would be so much worse

if I didn't have these guys coming to get me out.

Oh, my gosh. It's going right over the roof of the car now.

And it's coming in through the side windows as well.

It's a scary experience for Zoe,

but she is safe as the trained experts are close by.

The water rushes over the car and round the sides.

Even though the windows are open, it doesn't come inside too much.

At least, that's the theory.

This is terrifying.

Because of the force of the water, I can't open the door

and I've been trapped inside for a whole three minutes.

I'm definitely ready to get out.

Using their bodies as a barrier against the water,

they are able to open the door as a group and walk me back to safety.

Training such as this is vital in order to prepare

rescue services for real-life flooding situations.

That is just the most scary thing,

I think possibly the most frightening thing I've ever done in my life.

It's so intense. It's hard to describe.

I was hanging on for dear life.

The sound of it is just completely overwhelming.

You can't even hear your own screams. It's really dramatic.

Now, from rescuing people in vehicles,

to an extraordinary vehicle that rescues people.

Mike checks out some technology with a difference.

Hovercrafts are vital for rescuing people stranded by floods.

These amazing machines can travel across water

and also hover across land.

Some of you might have travelled on a hovercraft on holiday

between England and France.

The smaller ones are ideal for getting to people who have

been trapped by flood water.

Mike is in Southampton to discover why hovercrafts are the vehicle

of choice for emergency services in flood rescue.

And I'm with Mark, the man in the know.

These hovercraft are always the first thing to show up. Why is that?

Because they are so adaptable at getting to all the areas,

both overland, over the debris, over the sea.

And they get there really quickly.

Whether it's water, sand, snow, land, this works,

-this will float over the top?

-Absolutely.

It will hover over the top, yes.

Is there any way I could take a spin in this one and see what it's like?

Why not? We'll get one of our pilots, James, to take you.

Awesome, let's do it. All right.

All right, here we go. The big boy toy! This is awesome.

Never been on a hovercraft before.

Woooah!

It just flies over the water.

So how do these amazing machines work?

The hovercrafts have a gigantic fan which blows air

into the cushion underneath them.

This lifts the hovercraft body off the ground

and then you're floating along on a cushion of air.

If you want to buy one of these, you better start saving your coins

because these cost around £150,000.

And now it's my turn to have a go.

I've only been a captain for ten seconds,

and I'm already encountering big waves.

I am having fun travelling quickly,

but it's this speed that helps save lives.

Small boats need water that's at least waist height in order to move.

But this hovercraft is the perfect three-in-one.

It can power across deep water, skim across shallow water,

and glide over land.

Still on land.

Nice smooth ride. And now we're transitioning to water.

Now we're on the water.

I can see why these are so important for flooding

conditions in saving lives.

To get into the area where the flooding has occurred

and rescue the people.

This is fun, it's safe, it's important,

and I have a new gain of respect for the technology involved

with this, because it gives you the ability to go on

and rescue people in any kind of condition, in any kind of terrain.

The threat of flooding here in the UK is not going away.

With one of the wettest summers on record in 2012,

flooding and its devastation is becoming something

that many of us may experience.

One country that is well adapted to living with the constant threat

of flooding is Holland.

For hundreds of years,

it has suffered more floods than any other country in the world.

We've sent Mike on a trip to Holland to see how engineers are coming

up with clever ways to manage the threat of flooding.

Holland is a very flat country and most of it is below sea level.

That means that the people who live here have always had to fight

to stop water from invading their land.

The whole of Holland is crisscrossed with ditches

and canals that are like huge drains that keep the water off the land.

It's a bit like the rain that falls on your roof being carried

away by guttering.

And here in Rotterdam, Holland's second largest city,

they have created a massive tank

the size of four Olympic swimming pools that can store

any excess water. And it's hidden.

That's right, we're in an underground parking lot.

It doesn't look very special, does it?

But this type of parking lot can save cities from flooding.

The problem with a city or town is when it rains a lot,

the rain has nowhere to go.

Grass and soil can absorb the water, but concrete definitely cannot.

And there's lots of concrete in a city.

When it rains a lot, the sewers and drains fill to the top

and there's nowhere for the water to go, except for in your home,

and you definitely don't want that.

And to stop flood water entering the homes,

here in Rotterdam they have come up with a way of storing it.

There's a water storage facility underneath that fills

with water to the top,

which basically keeps the water from flowing through the streets.

Daniel's about to give me

a sneak peek at where all the water goes, underneath the car park.

So, welcome to the underground storage facility.

Wow, this is impressive.

This is basically where all the magic happens?

-Yes. Everything behind the window, actually.

-Wow.

So how many litres does this hold?

It holds ten million litres of water.

Why is the window so dirty?

It's rainwater combined with the sewer water.

-So you wouldn't want to go swimming in there!

-No, you wouldn't.

-It's pretty dirty.

-Is there any way I can actually see it happen?

Yeah, we're going to open a valve

and then this massive amount of water is going to drop in.

Daniel's about to release 20,000 litres of flood water.

About 100 bathtubs full,

to show me what it will look like when these pipes empty.

-That was amazing!

-It's pretty cool, isn't it?

This amount of mucky flood water

would be enough to wreck anyone's home.

Before we had this, we had massive flooding in the streets

and also in basements and shops in the city centre.

And after we built this, we actually reduced this.

So this facility gives us dry feet.

-So this is very important for the city?

-It is. It is, yes.

In the battle against flooding,

the Dutch engineers are certainly putting up a good fight.

But with 2012 being the wettest year on record,

what is being done in the UK to help with flooding?

People unlucky enough to own houses that have been flooded are

making changes so they're not totally ruined if the water levels do rise.

They're fitting electronic sockets at higher levels,

replastering rooms with water-resistant material,

and getting rid of carpets from the ground floor of houses.

London has built the world's second largest flood barrier.

When closed,

the Thames Barrier stops rising water levels in the Thames Estuary

from flooding the 12 million people who live in Britain's capital city.

But if water should come your way, and the worst does happen,

there are ways to maximise your chances of surviving in a flood.

Here's our Fierce Earth survival guide.

If it rains too much in a very short space of time, be aware.

Check the weather reports. Do not try to cross flood water.

In the unlikely event you find yourself trapped in a car,

get out and onto the roof as quickly as possible.

This is how you maximise your chances of surviving the Fierce Earth.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd