Floods hit Northampton as heatwave ends with nearly inch of rain falling

Firefighters were called to 27 reports of flooding in Northamptonshire in less than four hours as heavy rain battered the county on Tuesday night (August 16).

Fire chiefs say the vast majority of calls were from Northampton and Kettering, with nearly an inch of rain falling.

One crew dug a ditch to divert running water away from a house in Rothersthorpe Road while another pumped water from a property in Harlestone Road.

More firefighters inspected or offered advice at a series of incidents in Upton, Briar Hill and Delapre.

The Met Office weather station at Pitsford recorded 23.4mm of rain on Tuesday, most of it during the deluge after 8pm.

A yellow warning for more storms today now covers only London and the South East as far north as Milton Keynes. But weather watchers say more rain is still highly likely in the county on Wednesday.

Northamptonshire Fire & Rescue Service group manager Ro Cutler said: “The recent hot weather and dry conditions means that the ground is finding it very difficult to absorb water at the moment – so there was always a possibility of flash flooding when heavy rainfall was forecast and it’s something we have been well prepared for.

“Our control team had to deal with a lot of calls in a short amount of time last night so we’d like to thank them for their hard work, as well as that done by our firefighters and officers – whether it was offering advice, inspecting drains or pumping water out of properties.”

Tuesday’s deluge followed an eight-day heatwave which led to firefighters dealing with nearly FIVE TIMES more calls than at this time in 2021.

The county’s fire service received more than 800 calls to its control room about 328 different incidents between August 7 and August 13 — compared to fewer than 250 calls fielded in a week in August last year.

Chief Fire Officer, Darren Dovey, admitted the surge in fires left crews “exhausted” after dealing with regular largescale incidents in tough working conditions.

He added: “During this week last year we only had three incidents that required more than one fire engine. This week we’ve had 31 — including one incident where we had ten engines.”