Couple fear for balancing home
Flood waters have left one couple literally teetering on the brink. Ray and Diann Scriven were today bringing in engineers to assess the damage to the Paper Mill, in Alveley, where they have lived for 40 years.
They returned home at about midnight on Tuesday to find a huge rift had torn through the 250-year-old mill waterfall, leaving their house balancing on the edge of a deep gorge.
They now fear their entire house in Alveley, near Bridgnorth, may collapse into the brook below.
The waterfall, made of massive boulders, was around 10ft high and two metres thick. Most of the garden has also fallen in a landslide.
Mrs Scriven said: "We are completely devastated. We fear that the whole house could fall at any time. Parts of the garden and a path fell on Wednesday.
"If the conservatory goes, the rest of the house might go with it. We just don't know what to do.
"We have been here for 40 years and we have never seen anything like this. We were not in at the time but the force must have been incredible."
The house was one of a number of properties severely damaged by freak thunderstorms on Tuesday night.
The nearby Mill Hotel & Restaurant at Alveley was today continuing a clean-up operation as it prepares to six weddings this weekend.
It is facing a clean-up bill of £250,000 after becoming swamped by flood water.
General manager Ian Hunter, said: "It is going to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds but at the moment all that is important is getting the place ready for the weddings."
More torrential downpours are predicted for today and the entire weekend in the West Midlands, although there will also be sunny intervals.
Forecasters have warned there could also be thunderstorms, creating the freak downpours that caused the flash flooding along long sections of the Severn Valley earlier this week.
Tony Conlan, of MeteoGroup UK, said: "Some showers could be torrential and there will be scattered thunder storms and flash flooding in some places across large parts of the UK. It's difficult to predict where exactly but we will be monitoring the situation as the day goes on."
